


A Shoulder to Cry On

by Paladin777



Series: What Came Next [3]
Category: Code Lyoko
Genre: Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Eventual Romance, F/M, Friendship, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-17
Updated: 2020-08-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:40:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 31,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25944496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paladin777/pseuds/Paladin777
Summary: The tears, the laughs, and the tender moments between Odd and Sissi's developing friendship and more as she gets more and more accepted into the group and works on getting over Ulrich. Takes place during the time jump from 'What Came Next 2.
Relationships: Odd Della Robbia/Sissi Delmas
Series: What Came Next [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1880596
Kudos: 9





	1. Awkward Beginnings

**Author's Note:**

> This is an idea I had while writing What Came Next 2. It takes place during the time jump and is going to be a bunch of episodes showing the progression of the friendship and eventually relationship in that particular head-canon. I hope you like it!

I do not own Code Lyoko or any affiliates it may have. I am just a fan like you all.

One week, Awkward beginnings

POV Odd

It had been a week since I first followed Sissi and she cried on my shoulder. She had eaten lunch with us every day since then, and I was really impressed she was able to spend time with Ulrich and Yumi in the same place. They weren't the most openly affectionate people which I'm sure helped, but I don't know if I could have stuck around if I were in her shoes. She must really want to be friends with us a lot, though I guess she must have been starved for real friendship for a very long time.

There was something that they must have done today that was more than she could handle, or maybe she just hit her limit of seeing Ulrich and Yumi together. I'm not sure which it was, but I saw the look on her face when she had enough and went quiet. She stayed and finished lunch with us though and went to afternoon classes like normal, but she never came to dinner.

I ate in record time. "Hey guys, I'm going to go meet up with a friend, I'll see you later!" I looked around at everyone at the table. Yumi was already gone and eating dinner with her family, Jeremy waved rather disinterestedly as he had his nose in his physics book. Aelita had a knowing look on her face, which I confirmed with a small nod myself. Ulrich however teased, "meeting up with a girlfriend Odd!?"

"No Ulrich, just a friend." I replied flatly, which shut him up pretty quickly, and headed to the counter to approach Rosa the lunch lady. "I don't think Sissi is feeling very well right now, I was wondering if I could bring her dinner to her.

Rosa smiled at me, "Sure Odd, I haven't seen her all evening. I'll get you a to-go box." She prepped the meal to go and came back. "Here you go!"

"Thanks Rosa!"

I took the box and headed up to Sissi's dorm room and listened at the door. I heard a little bit of movement, so I knocked a few times.

"Go away."

Well, at least she wasn't screaming through the door. "It's me, Odd."

"I don't want to talk right now."

"That's fine, I didn't see you at dinner, so I brought you some food." I really hoped that she'd be more likely to let me in after last week.

"I'm not hungry."

I wasn't ready to give up yet. "You sure?"

There was silence for a little bit. "No..."

I heard movement for a moment and then the door opened. Sissi stood there in her PJ's and she had definitely cried a little, though not as bad as last week. Her Mascara had only run a little though her eyes still looked a little red.

I held out the little to-go box. "It's beef stroganoff, and it's pretty good.

She took the box and stepped back from the doorway letting me in. "You know you didn't need to come." She looked tired.

"What kind of friend would I be if I didn't?" I tried to be cheerful about it, but it didn't seem to have any effect.

Sissi sat down on her bed, gave me a blank look and opened the box. She gave the greasy contents a sour look while unwrapping a plastic fork, "ugh, that's going to go straight to my hips..."

Sitting down on the seat at her vanity, I thought I might try to get this awkward ball rolling. "So, what happened? At lunch it looked like you hit some sort of wall."

Sissi glared at me before taking a bite of the stroganoff. "I told you I didn't want to talk."

Ok, this was going to require a little more tact... "Ok, then I will."

She further narrowed her eyes.

Undaunted I continued. "You know, I'm really impressed that you've eaten with us every day even after last week. You've really been trying to make the best of things, haven't you.?"

Her glare disappeared and she stared idly into her food. "I'm trying, but it's... hard." She took another bite, then looked at me. "It's hard seeing them together."

"I'll bet, but you're trying. That counts for a lot." We sat in silence for a while she continued eating.

After she ate about half of it, Sissi stopped. "I can't eat any more of this, it's too greasy. Do you want the rest?"

"Sure thing."

She flopped on the bed, still looking in my direction. "I'm feeling a little better now, thanks for bringing me something to eat."

I closed the box and got up. "You're welcome, any time." I headed for the door but stopped and turned back for a moment. "Sissi?"

She looked up at me.

"You know you'll always have a shoulder to cry on if you need it."

Sissi just looked up at me for a moment as if not understanding what I'd said, then she let out a small but genuine smile. "Thanks Odd, I appreciated the company."

I left and started walking down the hall towards the stairwell, but I heard a door open and shut behind me. When I turned around, I saw Aelita quickly walking towards me.

"Is she ok?" Asked Aelita, concerned.

"She'll be fine, just a little down this afternoon. She was a little better when I left, but I thought I shouldn't push my luck too far."

"Probably a good idea, I just wanted to check. I'm glad you're making the effort to be her friend, I think she needs it. I've got a lot of homework though, so I'll see you later." She walked off and into her room and I went to mine.


	2. Painful Sight

Three weeks, Middle of October.

Painful sight

POV Sissi

I saw Aelita and Jeremy from the steps of the science building heading towards the woods after class one afternoon. That used to happen a lot, but I hadn't seen it in a while. At first I figured they were just going to the woods to make out or something. After all, everyone keeps saying that they're head over heels for each other. That was until I saw Ulrich and Yumi heading into the woods about five minutes later. They've got to be up to their old secrets! Since they'd welcomed me as a friend I'd been trying not to pry into their mysterious absences that used to be common, but right now I was just too curious not to follow!

I headed that way too in order to follow them. When I got to the edge of the woods, I thought I heard Ulrich laugh and I slowed down and tried to sneak in for a closer look. I heard feet shuffling on the other side of a large tree, so I quietly started edging around the tree and saw a sliver of Ulrich standing on the other side. Curious I kept edging around the tree until I saw a hand coming out of a black sleeve caress his cheek then run through his hair! My heart lodged itself in my throat, and against my better judgment I leaned to the side to see just a little more... they were kissing... I couldn't see much of Yumi's face, but I could see almost all of Ulrich's. He looked so happy... happy with her... and not me... my hands clenched into fists and started to shake, and my legs felt like jello. I took off as fast as I could, no longer making any attempt to be quiet. I ran up to my room, slammed the door, dove on my bed face down, and began sobbing loudly.

A few minutes later there was frantic knocking at the door, "Sissi! I can hear you in there, and I know what you saw. Can I come in!?" I knew it was Odd, but I didn't pay any attention. He kept knocking. "Sissi, please answer!"

My pride didn't want anyone seeing me like this, but I remembered how much better it was with Odd here last time. He had already seen this before anyway, and I wanted to feel comforted like last time. My pride lost out to comfort and his acceptance as I weakly called out, "It's open."

He walked in and locked the door behind him. "I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want anyone else seeing this." I looked over in his direction and saw the concern on his face. I knew he was happy for his friends, but somehow, he also cared about how much I was hurt by it. He walked over and helped me sit upright before sitting down himself. Then he put his arms around me and held me close while I gripped his shirt and loudly cried on his shoulder again. "It's alright, you're gonna be ok." It didn't make the pain go away, but now I wasn't alone anymore. That was something at least.

I didn't know how long we stayed that way, but it was quite a while before I started to calm down. I lifted my head and backed away from him feeling rather embarrassed as I felt the pressure of his arms, which had been holding me tightly, pull away. It was a bit much.

"Are you feeling any better?" Asked Odd

I couldn't look at him. Last time he saw me really break down we had to leave in a hurry to go to class, so there really wasn't any of this awkward lingering. "Yeah, I guess so."

I thought back to seeing Ulrich in the woods earlier, and the look on his face. I sharply inhaled and held the breath for a bit before exhaling again slumping my head in the process. "He looked so happy."

Odd put his hand on my shoulder. "That's because he is. They make each other happy, that's why they're together."

"I guess that makes sense."

"If you really want to move on like you told him, you're going to need to accept that he really is happy with Yumi."

I felt a flash of irritation with him when he mentioned her name. "I know that!" I hissed looking up to glare at him.

He pulled his hand off my shoulder while jumping back in surprise. "Hey! No need to bite my head off, I'm only trying to help!"

Odd didn't deserve that, and I knew it. Now I felt bad about that too and looked away again. I was still irritated, but not at him. "I know." I looked at the clock on my desk and saw that somehow he had been here for nearly two hours. I groaned and flopped back to lay down on the bed. "Thanks for coming again. I don't want to kick you out, but I've got a lot of homework that I still need to get done and I've really been having a hard time with it."

"Would you like some help?"

I sat up on my elbows. "No offense Odd, but you're not exactly tutor material..."

Odd laughed. "I wasn't talking about getting help from me! If you want I'll ask Aelita. She's as smart as Jeremy, and a much better teacher. Ulrich and I have been getting help from both of them lately and it shows!" I had to admit, it seemed like a good idea, and I needed the help. "How about you wash your face a little and then we'll go ask? After all she's only across the hall!"

Wash my face? I got up and looked in the vanity mirror... OH GOD, I LOOKED AWFUL! It looked worse than the last time I broke down on Odd's shoulder. I turned on my heel towards him. "ODD DELLA ROBBIA, IF YOU SPILL ONE WORD OF WHAT YOU'VE SEEN HERE, YOU'RE DEAD!"

"Come on Sissi! I haven't told anyone about anything!" He replied indignantly.

Ignoring him, I got a wash cloth and wiped my face down well enough. "Ok, let's go!" I said in a huff.

"Hey Sissi!"

I turned to face him. "What!"

He stood up and smiled at me then walked up to the door. "You look like you're feeling a bit better." Then he opened the door and stepped aside as to let me go first like a gentleman.

I just stood there for a moment before I felt a small smile grow on my face. He was right, I did feel better. I walked out the door towards Aelita's room with Odd walking next to me.

Across the hall Odd knocked on the door to Aelita's room and when she opened the door, she saw us standing there and was all smiles. "Hi guys, what's up?" I was still a bit shook up, but I had real friends now. That made it seem like things were going to be ok.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, this is probably going to be the last Sissi breakdown in the series. Next one will probably start on the real friendship building between the two.


	3. Family Ties

Four weeks, late October.

Family Ties

POV Odd

It was just after dinner on Friday. Ulrich and Yumi we're headed out to the movies, Jeremy and Aelita were doing some work on his robots, and my homework was already done. I needed to find something to do or be bored the rest of the evening. I thought maybe Sissi was free this evening and wouldn't mind some company.

I headed up to her dorm room and stopped at the door. This was the first time I'd ever come here just to hang out, and not because of her being upset. I didn't know how she'd react, so I hesitated before knocking, but only for a moment.

Sissi opened the door and looked at me slightly confused. "Hi Odd, what are you doing here?"

"I thought I'd see if you wanted to hang out for a while!" I tried to sound as cheerful as I could. I wanted to keep this a pleasant visit for a change.

"Uhh... Yeah, sure. Come on in!" She said, shaking her head a little as she snapped out of her confusion. She stepped aside letting me in then closed the door behind us. "Did you have anything in mind?"

"No, not really." I glanced over at her desk and saw an open sketchbook with some doodles in it. "You like to draw?" I asked gesturing to her desk.

Sissi walked to the desk quickly and closed the sketchbook. "Yes, I like to draw, but I'm not very good."

I came over as well, "Come on, it can't be that bad, let me see!"

"Only if you promise not to laugh"

I stood up straight with one hand raised and the other over my heart. "I cross my heart and hope to die that I will not laugh at the contents of your sketchbook!"

She snorted and giggled, "fine, here you go!"

I flipped through the sketchbook. "Most of these are kinda rough, but I think there's some potential for improvement! It just takes some practice!"

Sissi looked at me flatly. "Odd, I've been sketching for years... there hasn't been much improvement."

"Aaaaaaaannnnnnd a little fine tuning!" I sat her down at the desk, handed her a pencil, and gave her a little lesson on depth and shading. A half hour later, she had a fairly convincing drawing of a bottle of perfume I had taken from her vanity. She was very proud of herself, and I was proud of her too!

"You're pretty good at this!" Sissi exclaimed when she was done with her drawing.

"The Della Robbia's are family of artists, it's in my blood!" It was against my nature not to brag at least a little bit!

"Wow, that's cool! I just have my father." She looked down suddenly seeming rather sad. "he's just always been so busy with the school that he's never really had a lot of time for me. It gets kinda lonely."

"Well, what about your mom?" I instantly regretted asking as she looked even sadder.

"She left when I was little. I normally get a Christmas card every year, but I almost would prefer nothing at all. The card just reminds me that she's still out there but has never bothered to come see me."

I felt bad for her. I guess all this time maybe it wasn't all her fault that she had been such a brat. She was lonely, and probably felt pretty abandoned too. I'll bet she didn't know how else to deal with it. I walked behind her chair and put my arms around her from behind. She stiffened in surprise at first, but quickly relaxed into it. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to dredge all that up."

She gently placed her hand on my forearm and leaned her head back into me. "That's ok. How about you tell me about your family?"

"Well, my mom's a painter, and my dad's a musician in a back-up band. He does the background music for a lot of pop singers so he's on the road a lot."

"That's pretty cool! Do you have any siblings?" Eager to keep the attention off her family, and I didn't blame her at all.

"Get this, I've got FIVE older sisters! Marie's an opera singer, Adele and Pauline are dancers on broadway, Elizabeth owns an art studio, and Louise is an Accountant!"

Sissi burst out laughing at the Accountant! "Well that was unexpected!"

"That's true, but she can finger-pick a mean guitar! She's the one who taught me how to play."

"That's a lot of sisters. I wish I had siblings."

"Eh, that's fair. But being the youngest of six and the only boy can be kinda rough, especially when my dad was out on tour!"

"I suppose that's true!" Sissi said with a giggle. I let go of her and went over to sit down on the bed while she turned around in her chair towards me. "Sooooo... if Aelita's your cousin, where does she fit in?"

My eyes got wide and I otherwise froze. I didn't know if the question was loaded or innocent, and I never thought about how to fit Aelita into my family tree before! "Ah, well... umm... she's from Canada you know..." I started stammering.

"Odd, stop." Sissi looked at me a little hurt. "Aelita isn't your cousin, is she?"

I really didn't want to lie, but I couldn't tell her the truth either. "Umm..." was all I managed to get out.

"Never mind. I know you guys have your secrets, and I'm sure you have good reasons for keeping them. You don't have to tell me, but please...". She took a shallow breath and looked away before whispering, "Just... please don't lie to me. I can take it from the others, but not you. Not anymore." She looked back at me. "I won't bring it up again, ok?" She took a deep breath to clear the air and looked at the clock. It was nearly time for lights out, "Thanks for the drawing lesson, and it was kinda cool learning about your family." She said seeming to regain her composure.

"You're welcome! Let's do this more often! I liked learning more about you too." I said cheerfully, also having recovered.

I left wondering how on earth I was going to keep our secrets because I didn't want to hurt her anymore. After showing me her unguarded side, I kept finding her more and more endearing. Maybe I could talk to Aelita about it sometime, I didn't know who else to talk to. She was the only one who even knew I was coming here!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not much to comment here, this one sprang out pretty easily. Hope you guys liked it!


	4. Learning

Seven weeks, Mid November.

Learning

POV Sissi

It was a Wednesday night, and Odd had come up to my room again just to hang out. He'd been coming up a couple times a week now, and though sometimes it still felt kinda strange having him here, he really was good company. This time he brought his guitar and was sitting on my bed playing some soft acoustic Subdigitals renditions. I was sitting back in my desk chair mostly enjoying the music, but there was a little bit of a problem. "Hey Odd, could you stop for a second."

Odd looked confused. "What, you don't like my playing?"

"Your playing's great, it's your singing. You can't carry a tune in a bucket!" I replied with a giggle.

He snorted out a laugh. "That bad!?"

"Sorry to be the bearer of bad news!"

"I didn't think it was THAT terrible, I guess I was wrong. Oh well." He shrugged and started strumming again. It was much better without the singing, and I sat for a while enjoying it much more.

"Hey Odd, can I ask you a question?"

"Sure!" He responded, still strumming away.

"What is it about Yumi that makes Ulrich like her?" I've never really talked to her much, so she was a bit of a mystery to me.

He quieted, his guitar. "Are you sure you want to ask that? It's probably going to hurt."

"I need to know, and I think I'm ready." I braced myself.

Odd put his guitar away while it looked like he was thinking of an answer. "Yumi is the kind of person that is confident, but doesn't flaunt it. She's very capable, smart, and tough. However, if you can get beneath the tough surface you'll find someone who is really kind, caring, and completely devoted to her friends and would do anything for them."

My shoulders slumped. "Sounds like a real catch." If those were the things that attracted Ulrich to her, then I had been beaten from the start. A lot of that just wasn't me. "How does someone compete with that."

He shrugged. "You don't. You find someone who's not looking for those things." I looked at him a skeptically, then he continued. "You often tried flirting with Ulrich, but that was never going to get you very far. It just doesn't do anything for him. I don't know if I've ever seen him and Yumi flirt with each other, it's not their thing." Well that's a surprise, I'd never noticed! Odd continued. "Take Aelita for another example, she is very kind, sweet, and sincere. That's wonderful for Jeremy, but for Ulrich and me she's like our sister. Neither one of us will ever have any romantic attraction to her, that would just be weird."

He pretty much just confirmed that Aelita wasn't his cousin by talking about her like she could've been a possible suitor, but I guess I already knew that. Even so, everyone seemed to like Aelita, myself included. A couple weeks ago she started tutoring me after Odd suggested it, and she really was nice, extremely smart, and overall very pleasant to be around. "That's great for Jeremy, but I still don't get what Aelita sees in him."

"Hmm...Jeremy's a tough one to describe..." he rubbed his chin, thinking. "Well, Jeremy is just as smart, if not smarter, than Aelita, so it's good that they can keep up with each other." He took a breath looking around the room, still thinking. "Let's just say that he would do absolutely anything for Aelita."

I wasn't sure what to make of how absolute that last statement was, so I sighed because it sounded like one of the things he can't talk about. I didn't want to think about being left out right now though, and I had something more pressing I needed to know. I took a deep breath and readied myself for the hardest question, though I think I already knew the answer. "Do you think that I was never right for Ulrich?"

He shook his head. "No, I don't think you were. But I don't think he was right for you either." I fell into a slouch. Odd was his best friend, and anymore he was my best friend too. If anyone knew that answer, it was going to be him. "I do know one thing!" He continued cheerfully, "I'm sure there's someone that is right for you, and you are just perfect for!"

That made me feel a little better and a small smile crept up to my face. Anymore, he had gotten pretty good at cheering me up. "So Odd, What's your type?" I asked.

"Probably someone playful, flirty, with just the right amount of sass!"

"And you couldn't find that in the whole school?" I teased, giving him a sly look.

I meant to be playful with that remark, but it looked like it just made him sad. "You know, I'm sure there was, but I probably screwed it up. I'm really good at the asking out part, but after that I really make a terrible boyfriend."

I was stunned he admitted that. "Wow, I guess I didn't know it bothered you that much."

He looked at the floor. "It never used to, but now I know I was a real self-centered jerk."

I got up from the chair and sat down next to him. "What made you think that?"

Still looking at the floor he responded. "Talking to you." I jerked my head in surprise and stared at him as he continued. "If the Sissi Delmas I used to enjoy tormenting so much has a heart and mind and could really be hurt by things I did, and said, enough to think I hated her, then every one of those other girls is probably the same way. Everyone that I two-timed, ignored after asking out, or was just dismissive with wasn't just a pretty face. They all had thoughts and feelings and I didn't even think about how I acted could have effected them."

I didn't even know what to say, so I just sat next to him quietly. A few minutes later, I started to put my arm around him, but I hesitated before setting my hand down on his shoulder. He was too lost in thought to notice it was hovering there. In the last few weeks he'd put his arms around me quite a few times for my comfort or just company, but I'd never done the same. It was strange being on this side. Finally, I set my hand down and he flinched a little, apparently startled at the touch. He looked at me for a second and I tried to smile reassuringly at him, but it still was a little awkward for a while. Eventually he relaxed and settled into my side, and then I relaxed and even started to like feeling him there.

Sometime later he spoke, "I guess neither one of us are the person we used to be."

"You're probably right. I'd like to think we're both better people." I guess we were learning from each other, I liked that. I looked at the clock and saw only twelve minutes until lights out. "Do you think you have time to play one more song?" I pulled my arm away as he reached down to grab his guitar again. When he looked back, I saw that he was smiling again before he started strumming.


	5. Apologies

Seven and a half weeks, Mid November.

Apologies

POV Odd

I trudged my way up the stairs, I had been at this for hours. My right cheek stung fiercely; my left had completely lost feeling a couple hours ago. My pride was all but shriveled up entirely, but my conscience was almost clear. I clutched the notebook with the list that represented even more hours worth of preparatory work to my chest as I knocked on the very last door...

POV Sissi

It was about 7:00 pm on Sunday, and I was enjoying a lazy evening reading some magazines when I heard a knock on the door. I figured it was probably either Odd or my father. When I opened the door, Odd was standing there holding a notebook in front of him. His cheeks had the telltale redness of being slapped repeatedly, and his face was filled with remorse when he looked at me before reading from his notebook.

"Elisabeth Delmas, in the past I have insulted you, ridiculed you, humiliated you, and was a complete jerk to you both publicly and privately." He let the notebook fall to his side as he looked up and I saw tears welling up in his eyes as he let the notebook fall to his side. "And I'm... sorry." A couple of the tears fell down his cheeks.

I was so touched I couldn't help but walk over and wrap him in a big hug before leading him inside my room where we sat down on the bed. "Apology accepted, and I'm sorry too for having always been such a spoiled brat!" I put my arm around him slightly amazed at how comfortable we'd gotten around each other. "What's with the notebook, and why do you look like you've been slapped silly?"

He handed it to me. "I just finished apologizing to every girl in the school I'd ever been a jerk to. Most of them slapped me before I got started."

I beamed at him. "Sorry you got slapped so many times, but I'm very proud of you for doing that." I opened the notebook to several pages worth of names and notes of things he did. Each one had a check mark next to it. "This has got to be everyone in our grade!"

"Let's just say that the rumor that I'd kissed every girl in our grade isn't exaggerating by very much... I can only think of one that I haven't..."

I felt my nose wrinkle. "That's... kinda gross... so who's the lucky lady left out?" He just looked at me dumbly until I realized it was me. "oh... riiiiiiiight..." I wasn't sure if I should feel special, or left out. Before I thought it through, I blurted out "Oh, what the heck!" And turned his face towards me and gave him a real quick peck on the lips!

He stared at me in utter confusion while I couldn't help but giggle at the look on his face, "What was that all about!?"

"Don't you get the wrong idea! I just didn't feel like being left out, and now you live up to the rumor!" I stuck my tongue out at him 'ttthhhbbbttt,' then we both laughed.

We spent the rest of the evening with Odd telling me about some of the more dramatic apologies while we laughed and joked like usual.

Anymore I was starting to really like when he stopped by.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a little half chapter follow up to the last one. Anymore I don't remember if I came up with the ideas for the last chapter, or this one first! Either way, I enjoyed writing both!


	6. Discovery

Ten weeks, Early December

Discovery

POV Ulrich

It was Tuesday evening and Jeremy, Odd, Aelita, Sissi and me were just getting out of dinner. Yumi was already at home having a 'family night,' and my homework was done, or at least as done as it was going to be without some help from one of our resident geniuses. It wasn't long after Odd and I got to our room that he said that he was headed out, presumably to meet his mysterious 'friend' that he'd been spending a lot of time with. Normally I used this time to talk to Yumi on the phone privately, but since that wasn't an option today, I thought it was time to figure out who it was.

After Odd left, I cracked the door and watched him go towards the stairs leading up to the girl's dorm hallway. So maybe it's not a girlfriend, but it's definitely a girl, I thought to myself. When he rounded the corner going up the stairs I bolted as quietly as I could to follow. After I turned the corner myself, I stayed low to the stairs to stay hidden and saw him knock on the door across the hall from Aelita's room. Wait a second, that's Sissi's room! Sure enough, a few seconds later Sissi opened the door, both of their faces lit up upon seeing each other, then embraced each other in what definitely looked like a more-than-friends hug, then they both disappeared into her room. I was stunned with my mouth hanging open for probably a full minute! Was Odd going out with Sissi in secret? That wouldn't make sense as he was the one who suggested that Yumi and I shouldn't hide that we were together. Then again, the circumstances were pretty different. I finished walking up the stairs and stood in front of Sissi's door for a minute while trying to listen in. It just sounded like they were just talking and occasionally laughing. This whole thing was just weird. I turned around to head back to my room, but then I thought maybe I could ask Aelita what was going on. I knew that she had started tutoring Sissi several weeks ago and she roomed right next door. She should know what's going on, I just hoped she was here and not out with Jeremy somewhere. I turned to her room knocked.

Aelita poked her head out. "Oh, hi Ulrich! What's going on?" She greeted cheerfully.

"Hi Ulrich!" Apparently, Jeremy was here too.

"Hi Jeremy!" I called out past Aelita. "Can I come in for a minute?"

"Sure thing!" Aelita stepped away from the doorway. "So again, what's going on?"

I rubbed my face a little before starting. "Did you know that Odd is hanging out with Sissi... in her room...?"

Aelita answered first. "I didn't know he was there now, but I'm not surprised. He's there fairly often."

Jeremy followed up. "I didn't know he'd been coming up here, but I'm not surprised either. They've been getting pretty chummy."

I jerked back in surprise. "I haven't noticed anything like that."

Jeremy responded first this time. "In all fairness, you and Yumi are normally pretty preoccupied with each other."

I didn't know I could glare and blush at the same time, but Aelita chimed in, "and you should be. She's your girlfriend and we all know you've loved her for years, and it's only recently you're finally enjoying it instead of stressing over it. We all fully support the two of you."

Ok, fair enough, that calmed me down a little. "I guess I just wish he would have told me. He's my best friend, why would he try to hide this? Are they like, secretly going out or something? Their greeting definitely looked like it was more than 'just friends!'"

"They are definitely just friends right now, but I could see that eventually changing." How was I the only one not knowing this! "Why don't you go talk to them?" Aelita said flashing me a smile that told me she knew something I didn't.

"What, right now?"

"Yes. Then come back here, because we have something else to talk to you about."

I guess she was right, but I really didn't want to be seen walking into Sissi's room... heck I didn't really want to be there in general, but Odd had dodged the question way to many times, and here he was pinned down. "Alright, fine." I walked out the door and crossed the hallway. I could hear them talking through the door with the occasional laugh, just like before. I probably stood there for over a minute, feeling like a complete idiot before finally knocking.

The talking stopped, and I heard someone walking to the door before it opened a little and a saw Sissi looking out through it looking a little confused. "Umm... hi Ulrich. What are you doing here?"

"We need to talk." I growled.

"Uhh, now isn't really... a good time..." She stammered.

I didn't let up. "I need to talk to both you and Odd."

The confusion on her face gave way to surprise and possibly a little bit of guilt for some reason. "Ok, come in."

I walked after Sissi and saw Odd standing next to Sissi's vanity stool looking nervous about my arrival. "Alright, what's going on?" I spat out angrily.

"Umm... Sissi and I are... friends... what about it?"

"Thanks, Odd" I said sarcastically, "I kinda already noticed that!"

"Is it really that big a deal to you?"

I was really starting to get aggravated at him dodging the question. "I don't care that you're here, but why were you hiding it!" I was almost yelling at this point.

"BECAUSE I ASKED HIM TO!" Sissi shouted over me. I jerked my head over to where she sat down on her bed. Until this point, I'd been completely ignoring her after seeing Odd. She was looking at the floor with a frustrated expression on her face, shaking her head. "I don't want you two fighting over this, you're best friends." She looked up at me. "The first time Odd came here I asked him not to say anything about it, so please don't be mad at him for something I asked for."

My anger quickly faded into confusion. "Why?"

She hesitated before starting. "The first time Odd came here was after you told me you and Yumi were together. He came to comfort me and offer me his shoulder to cry on. I was embarrassed." I was speechless, she just let herself get embarrassed... for the sake of Odd and Me. Mostly Odd. Then I was shocked again as Odd moved to sit next to Sissi and put his arm around her comfortingly. She started chewing on her bottom lip nervously.

"Ulrich just go. I will talk to you later." Odd hissed, glaring at me.

I started to turn around. "No, wait. I've got something I need to tell you." I turned back around and saw Sissi stand up, pulling away from Odd before facing me. She squeezed her eyes shut and took several deep breaths before opening them again. "I'm happy for you and Yumi." I'd lost count of how many times my mind had already been blown away tonight. Considering my time spent as a Lyoko Warrior, I was pretty used to crazy things happening, but this might have taken the cake! I looked at Odd, but a proud grin broke over his face as he beamed at Sissi. "You and Yumi are great together, I mean it. I can see how happy you make each other." She turned back towards the bed where Odd helped her sit down. "I said it..." A mixture of relief and disbelief clear on her face. "I really said it." A couple of nervous chuckles escaped her.

Odd sat down next to her again and hugged her close. "You did good, I'm proud of you." He told her quietly.

I just stood there with my mouth opening and closing like a fish for probably a full minute before I regained any semblance of composure. "Do you mean that?" I managed to fumble out.

She looked at me, breathing a little heavily. "Yes. I'm still sad for me and it still hurts, but I've got a couple of amazing friends helping me move forward." She put her arm around Odd and pulled him into a side-hug. "One right here," then she pointed to the door, "and one across the hall, so... I'll be ok."

"Ok, Umm... I guess I'll be going now...?" I stammered out awkwardly.

"I'll see you at our room later. Don't forget I still need to chew you out for barging in here and yelling!" Odd calmed down a little, but he still wasn't happy with me... at this point I couldn't say I blamed him. "One more thing, Sissi and I are going to the Winter Formal as friends. We talked about it earlier today and thought you should know. I was going to tell you when I got back tonight."

"Yeah... sure... umm, ok" compared to everything else I heard this evening that was pretty tame... I walked out the door and headed to the stairs.

"And Where do you think you're going?" Crap, I forgot about Aelita and Jeremy. Turning around I saw her standing just outside her door with her hands on her hips. Groaning I walked over and followed her into the room.

"Ok, what did you need to talk about." Let's get this over with.

"First, I have to say that didn't sound like it went very well!"

"You're the one who said to go talk to them!" I was getting irritated again.

"She said talk to them, not yell at them!" Jeremy snapped. He didn't raise his voice much anymore, so it caught me off guard. He was right, but he wasn't going to hear me say that right now.

"That's enough." Aelite clearly had heard enough bickering for one night. "Anyway, you know how we've got that Christmas gift exchange sleepover at Yumi's planned before we all go our separate ways for the break?"

"Yeah, what about it?"

Aelita went to stand next to Jeremy. "We want to invite Sissi. She's going to be stuck here alone until New Years and I thought it'd be nice for her to spend some time with friends before we leave."

I'm not sure how much more talk of of Sissi I could handle tonight, but after everything I did tonight, I'd feel like a real jerk if I said no. "Who's 'we' so far?"

"Just Jeremy and me. We won't have to ask Odd twice, which leaves you and Yumi. I didn't want to bring it up to Odd unless you two are ok with it first."

Which meant I get to try to convince Yumi... and her parents... joy... more talk about Sissi...

I groaned again, "I'll see if I can talk to Yumi tonight."

Aelita's face brightened into a huge smile as she jumped up and gave me a big hug. "Thanks Ulrich!" That little girl is really good at getting her way. Good thing for Jeremy he's as stubborn as she is persuasive, otherwise he'd be in for some real trouble when the two of them finally decide to take the plunge!

I left and sent a message to Yumi to call when she had the chance, no rush. About an hour later she called me back.

"Hey Ulrich, What's up?"

"A lot, are you sitting down right now?"

"Yes..."

"Good, because I've had a very... interesting night."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apparently Odd can keep a secret, though we already knew that. Well, unless he's smitten with a blond 'Kadic Bombshell…" ;P Anyway, I'd been really looking forward to bringing more characters into this story. I didn't want to do it too soon, as I wanted the two of them to really bond first. I hope you all liked this.


	7. Gift Exchange

_Twelve weeks, Mid December_

_Gift exchange_

**POV Yumi**

It was the Saturday afternoon before Christmas, the day of our sleepover gift exchange and I was busy doing some house keeping. My parents consented to having everyone over, but they didn't celebrate Christmas, so I was to be completely responsible for getting ready and cleaning up afterwards.

I heard the doorbell ring, then my mom, "hello Ulrich, Yumi is in the front room, getting it ready for this evening." It was fortunate that my parents liked Ulrich. They were very appreciative of his part in helping me get them talking again after my dad walked out for a few days and were also quite supportive when I told them we were dating. Though they did insist on Hiroki staying out with us, presumably to keep an eye on Ulrich and me. As annoying as it was, I couldn't really blame them with tonight being a sleepover.

I turned towards the doorway and saw Ulrich's face light up when he saw me. That never got old and I felt my own face brighten as well. I walked over and kissed his forehead "Hi sweetheart! Could you give me a hand? i gestured to the furniture i was moving.

"Of course! By the way, I got the gift certificate we talked about."

I heaved a sigh. "I can't believe I let you talk me into having Sissi over here. I really hope this isn't a mistake." At least convincing my parents to allow another girl here was easy.

"I know what you mean, but I would have felt terrible saying no after barging in on her and Odd a couple weeks ago. He chewed me out for over ten minutes after he got back to the room. I guess both him and Aelita have been getting close to her. Just wait until you see what he's giving her for Christmas!"

"Aelita I can sort of understand, but It's still weird to hear that her and Odd have become such good friends. Although it seemed like they really had a good time at the dance last week. They always used to be at each other's throats!" I shook my head in bewilderment. "I take it I'm still not going to get any hints on the present?"

He grunted a small chuckle. "I know what you mean, but Odd made me promise not to say anything to anyone. I've probably said too much as is."

Before I could respond, the doorbell rang again and we looked at each other, confused. The others weren't supposed to be here for another few hours. We both headed to the front door to see Hiroki greeting Odd. He saw us approaching and looked nervous about something. "Umm... hi guys. I know I'm really, really early, but I was wondering if I could talk to you about something. Then I can either help get ready or leave and be out of your hair until tonight. Your choice."

I had to admit I was curious. "Beat it Hiroki! Yeah sure, what's going on?"

"I'm sure you're both getting sick of hearing about Sissi..." Ulrich and I both looked at each other sideways because we kinda were, which Odd noticed and quickly added, "but just hear me out on this one." I gestured for him to spit it out. "Well, every Christmas she gets a card from her mom."

"That sounds kinda nice..." I started but was interrupted by Odd.

"Except it's not. She hasn't seen her mom in 11 years. The cards are just a reminder that she couldn't be bothered to visit her only daughter, ever." He looked angry, and a little sad.

That's horrible. For all my parent's fighting they both still made time for me and Hiroki, and Ulrich's parents at least made a couple of soccer games per year. I still didn't really like Sissi much, but this made me feel bad for her. It was a weird feeling. I guess we could help with something. "So, what do you want us to do?"

Odd smiled in relief before pulling out a red envelope. He opened it and pulled out a Christmas card with a scene of a house covered in snow on the cover. It was pretty, but not very personal.

Ulrich looked at him confused. "So you want to make her feel better about getting a Christmas card from her mom, by giving her a generic Christmas card..."

Odd gave him a dirty look. "Just open it!"

I took the card and opened it up. He had put a picture of the six of us that was taken at the winter formal from about a week ago. From the way Odd and Sissi were hanging off each other, they looked more like a couple than Ulrich and me! Written inside the card was a small note.

_Merry Christmas Sissi,_

_In this season of holiday cheer, I just wanted to remind you of the friends in your life that care about you._

_Merry Christmas_

_Odd, Jeremy, Aelita_

I didn't know Odd could be so sweet and thoughtful, she must really mean a lot to him. "I was hoping you two would be able to sign it too."

We could do that, "do you have a pen?" Odd's face lit up as he pulled one from his pocket and handed it to me. We both signed it before giving it back.

"Thanks guys! I really appreciate it and I know she will too. Do you guys want help with anything? If not, I can take off and leave you two... _alone_?" Saying the last word very suggestively.

"Odd, get outta here!" Ulrich retorted lightly slapping Odd upside the head!

"Ok, ok, I'm going!" Odd turned around and called back as he was leaving, "see you two lovebirds later!"

After Odd left, we finished getting ready fairly quickly, then enjoyed snuggling into each other on the couch watching TV while we waited for everyone else to arrive. Once again, I was thankful that my parents really liked Ulrich and they didn't bother us much. Hiroki, however, was very supportive in some of the most obnoxious ways possible.

A couple hours later, the doorbell rang, and I got up to get it. I really hoped it wasn't Sissi yet, I certainly wasn't ready to have her over without a buffer. Fortunately, it was Aelita and Jeremy.

Aelita ran through the door and gave me a hug. "Yumiiiiii! Merry early Christmas!" She always loved Christmas.

"Hi Yumi!" I saw Jeremy holding a couple bags of presents. I figured one of them was Aelita's, which he was sweet for carrying them for her.

After Aelita let go I took one of his bags and gave him a hug with my unladen arm and we went to the living room where I'd left Ulrich. We all joked around reminiscing a little until the doorbell rang again, then things got a little tense. The only two left to arrive were Odd and Sissi, and there's no way that Odd was going to make her come here alone. I got up to get the door and thankfully Aelita got up to come with me.

On the way Aelita whispered to me, "I know you've never liked her, but give her a chance, she really is much nicer than we ever gave her credit for."

I forced a smile to my face, "I'll try." I opened the door to see Odd and Sissi standing there, each with a bag of gifts. Sissi looked nervous about being here. "Hi Odd, hello Sissi." Nice was going to be hard, hopefully polite would be enough. "Come on in, everyone else is already here." After Aelita gave them both hugs, I led them to the living room with everyone else. We all sat down with Ulrich, Aelita and I on the couch, Jeremy sat on the floor leaning back against the couch near Aelita, and Odd and Sissi plopped down on a sitting bench opposite the rest of us which was fine by me. His arm was casually around Sissi's shoulder.

Hiroki walked in the room, stopped, and stared slack-jawed at Sissi, "aren't you the one who's been trying to get between Ulrich and sis?"

"Hiroki! That was rude!" It may have been true, but she was still a guest here. "You know better than that!"

Sissi just put her hand up gesturing for me to stop. "No, it's ok." She smiled at Hiroki and waved him over next to her on the bench. "You're right. I did, but I haven't in a long time, and I'm not going to ever again."

"Good, because they're supposed to be together!" I felt my cheeks flush and when I glanced at Ulrich his were the same. When I looked back at Sissi, I could tell she was a little upset, but was doing a pretty good job hiding it. Hiroki didn't seem to notice, but Odd must have because he started rubbing her shoulder gently and she relaxed. Again, I found myself thinking that he must really care for her a lot, and they had to be very comfortable with each other to sit like that. That was quite the change from all the barbs and insults they used to fling at each other non-stop only a few months ago!

After a couple hours, a bit of chit chat, and a few pizza's later we decided it was time to open some presents. None of us had a lot of spending money, so it was going to be interesting what everyone came up with. Due to my Japanese heritage, I didn't intend on opening any tonight, and I was pretty sure Ulrich wouldn't either out of respect for me. Jeremy and Aelita were going to be together for the break so they were going to wait for Christmas Day to open each other's presents, so the whole affair was going to be rather short. Ulrich still had me very curious about exactly what it was that Odd got for Sissi.

"Hey Yumi, Ulrich, here you go!" Sissi gave us a couple of small boxes. Mine had a card attached. She looked a bit nervous.

"In Japan, gifts aren't opened in front of person who gave it to you." Ulrich patiently explained.

Sissi looked a little disappointed. "... could you at least make sure to open them together? It won't make sense if you don't."

Ulrich and I looked at each other, both curious now. "I think we can do that." I said before motioning for Ulrich to pass the gift card to one of those girly soap and makeup stores that we got for Sissi. She seemed really excited about it which was honestly kinda cute.

Everyone else exchanged gifts and laughed when Aelita and Sissi got each other the same fuzzy pink socks, which they both loved! Ulrich and Jeremy pitched in to get Odd a video game he'd been really wanting. Incidentally, the last things to be exchanged were Odd and Sissi's gifts to each other.

Sissi gave Odd a small thin package with a card attached. "It's not much, but I hope you like it."

He opened the card first and read it to himself, his smile getting wider as he continued reading. "Well, are you going to read it out loud?" Asked Jeremy.

"Nope!" He put the card back in its envelope and started unwrapping the package. It was a picture of the two of them at the winter formal in a very nice frame. They were dancing and looked like they were having a great time!

"It was the only picture of the two of us I could get my hands on. It took a bit of convincing to pry it out of Tamiya's hands!"

Odd looked like he got a real kick out of it. "It's fantastic." He pulled out a larger, but still flat package with the card we all signed earlier. I'd been kinda looking forward to seeing this one after Ulrich's unintentional teasing.

She opened the card first and read it, and reread it, and reread it again. Her bottom lip quivered just a little, and I could see her eyes start to water. She looked at each one of us one at a time before quietly saying, "thanks guys. I don't think you know how much this means to me." Probably not, but after Odd's visit earlier at least I had some idea.

"You've got one more!" Aelita chimed in. From the look on her face, I got the feeling she knew what it was.

Sissi pulled the paper off. "Oh wow, that's amazing." She said almost breathlessly.

"Well, let's see it!" I exclaimed. When she reluctantly turned it around, we could see that it was an incredibly well-drawn, framed 8"x11" pencil sketch of her and Odd. It showed them from the waist up standing next to each other, with his arm around her waist and hers around his shoulder.

Ulrich whispered to me, "he drew that five times before he was satisfied, each one took at least a couple hours. All of them were really good." Yet again, I was impressed at the care and devotion he seemed to have for her, and it certainly seemed to go deeper than just friends.

After we cleaned up the wrapping paper, we started watching a couple of Christmas movies. Halfway through the second one, everyone else fell asleep. Aelita and Jeremy had been sitting next to each other on the sitting bench during the movie, but now both had fallen over with Aelita snuggled on top of Jeremy. They were adorable, but Jeremy was going to be embarrassed when he woke up. Odd and Sissi were fell asleep on the floor a near each other. Ulrich was cuddled up next to me on the couch, and Hiroki was also on the floor. Unfortunately, I never got back into a normal sleeping routine after being on Lyoko duty and still only got around 4-5 hours of sleep a night at most. I was still quite awake around midnight and wasn't likely to fall asleep for almost two hours.

For some reason I couldn't quench my curiosity on what Sissi's gifts to Ulrich and me were and why we had to open them together. I also wasn't about to just sit here for the next couple hours, and It's wasn't like I could move without waking Ulrich, so I figured I'd see if he wanted to find out what they were too. I nudged him to see if he would wake easily and thankfully, he stirred without too much of a fuss. "Hey, sweetheart."

He groaned slightly before I shushed him. "What time is it?"

"Around midnight. I need to shut the TV off." He pulled himself off me and I walked over to the TV, but on my way back I grabbed the two small boxes from Sissi and the card. "I'm curious why we needed to open these together. Want to find out?"

"Let's do it in the kitchen, it'll make too much noise here."

In the kitchen I opened the card first.

It was pretty with a close up of part of a Christmas tree on the outside. Inside it had a handwritten note.

_Merry Christmas Yumi and Ulrich_

_I hope you have had a wonderful year. I want to tell you that I am very happy for you two. It's incredible to see how much you both light up whenever you see each other. i hope for the all the best for the both of you._

_In the past, I've tried to get between you two more times than I can count, and for that I'm very sorry. You two support and encourage each other so well, and that is something I never had any right to try to ruin._

_Sissi_

I handed the card to Ulrich and grabbed the box with my name on it. "That was very nice." Said Ulrich after reading it. After unwrapping and opening the boxes, we found a very nice looking black leather band in mine, and a brown one in his. They looked like watch bands without the watches. "Ok, I'm confused."

I pulled mine out of the box and found something stamped on the inside of the band.

_Immer Liebe_

いつも愛してる

I showed it to Ulrich, "Hey, look at this, it's the Kanji for 'love always.'

"Mine's got the same thing! 'Immer Liebe' also means 'love always,' only in German"

I put mine over my wrist, it would go well with my typical wardrobe. "I can definitely see why she wanted us to open them together. If you opened yours alone, it'd be really easy to get the wrong idea."

Ulrich held his up and looked at it. "It is pretty nice, but I'm not sure how I would feel about wearing something that Sissi got me."

"It's different for girls I guess."

"That, and the history between us."

"That's true too. I think the idea was sweet though." While we put the bands back in the boxes, I thought about how much Sissi had changed. "Before we let Sissi and Odd In, Aelita told me to give her a chance and that she is nicer than we thought. I think she might have been right."

Ulrich yawned widely. "Probably, both Odd and Aelita see it, and Jeremy's seen enoug to believe it. I've got to get to sleep though."

I looked at the clock to see it was twelve thirty. "I'll probably be up for another hour." I knew he wouldn't be happy about it, but Ulrich already knew about my sleeping issues, so he didn't make a big deal out of it. Instead, he pulled me in for a lingering kiss before we headed back into the living room.

"Goodnight Yumi, I love you."

"I love you too." He laid down on the couch and quickly fell asleep.

As I wondered what to do for the next hour, I heard some movement down on the floor. Sissi rolled over and unceremoniously flopped her arm over Odd! I had to stifle a laugh while it looked like Odd was starting to stir from the impact across his chest. His eyes fluttered open just a little and he looked over at the girl attached to the arm resting on him.

"...Sissi...?" he groaned sleepily. I wondered if he was going to wake up fully, or just nod back off to sleep. Either way, I was going to be entertained, and he was going to be pretty embarrassed when he woke up! My amusement quickly turned to wide eyed bewilderment when I saw him smile, then turn his back towards Sissi nestling into her to be the little spoon! I'm not sure how much he actually woke up, but the smile never left his face...

_To be continued_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this was a monster of a chapter, and I even had to split it in two! There was just a if things that I wanted to cover as this was really the first time I'm writing about the whole group in this story. Anyway, hope you liked it!


	8. Gift Exchange: Heart to Heart

_Twelve weeks, Mid December_

_Gift Exchange: Heart to Heart_

**POV Yumi**

I sat down on the stoop outside and started sipping on the cocoa I just made. As I felt the warmth from the drink combating the cold night air, I couldn't get the image of Odd and Sissi cuddling out of my head. He very clearly recognized her before moving in closer, so he had to be at least somewhat attracted to her whether he was aware of it yet or not. Looking back on the rest of the evening though; I guess it wasn't that hard to imagine. I took another sip of my cocoa and shivered realizing that it was losing the battle with the cold.

I was startled as I heard the door open and heard a girl's voice that was definitely higher than Aelita's. "What are you doing out here without a coat, it's cold!" I tensed up and stared straight ahead. I was fine being in a group with Sissi, but I wasn't ready to talk with her one-on-one! I jumped slightly, feeling a warm weight fall across my shoulders. She got me a blanket, a nice big fluffy one! I guess Aelita was right, she is nicer... I still didn't think I was ready for this.

I looked to my left to see her plopping down next to me, she had been smart enough to grab a jacket. "Thanks, what are you doing awake?"

"I woke up when I heard you in the kitchen, probably when you were stirring your cocoa." Darn, I was trying to be quiet. "What about you?"

"Insomnia. I only sleep about 4-5 hours a night."

"I'm sorry to hear that. That's probably not healthy, maybe you should get it checked out." I kinda wanted to tell her to mind her own business, but she seemed genuinely concerned. That, and it was still peaceful out here, and I didn't want to ruin it.

"Maybe." I replied flatly; I didn't want to further discuss it. We spent the next few minutes in awkward silence. I looked to my right down the road and could barely see the roof of the factory. There was always a strong sense of nostalgia when I looked at it, and probably always would be. I took another sip of my cocoa, then looked back to my left at Sissi. She was biting her bottom lip like she was nervous for some reason, and I didn't think it was from being near me. "Are you ok?"

She hesitated before answering, "how much... did you see inside?"

Oh yeah, I'd be nervous if I was caught like that too. Maybe I should play nice for right now. "You mean how you and Odd were when you woke up?"

Even in the dim light I could tell she was blushing horribly. "Yeah, that. I didn't mean for that to happen..."

"You don't need to be embarrassed. I'm the only one that saw it, and you didn't snuggle up to him." I didn't think it was possible for her to blush more, but when I said 'snuggle' she certainly did! "You rolled over in your sleep and your arm happened to flop over onto Odd. I watched it happen, and I thought it was funny!"

That brought a small grin to her face for just a moment, but it was quickly replaced by nervousness again. "Then how did we end up that... close?"

"Odd woke up enough to recognize you, then he scooted in before falling back asleep. I think he likes you." She pulled her knees up to her chest and now looked worried. "I take it you don't feel the same way."

"I don't know, but it doesn't really matter." I looked at her quizzically and she glanced my direction before looking forward again. "My life has changed so much in the last few months. Even if I did feel that way, I'm just not ready to handle throwing a relationship into it as well. Think about it, I'm trying to get over my years-long crush on Ulrich instead of feeding it. My best friends are Odd Della Robbia and Aelita Stones; I'm sure you remember our vicious insult wars! I find out tonight that Odd might even be crushing on me, and now I'm having 'girl talk' with Yumi Ishiyama! That's just weird, right!" We both laughed at how absurd all that would have been a few months ago, though it was short lived and we quieted down quickly.

"If he is crushing on you, you're going to have to talk about it sooner or later. It seems like you guys have gotten too close to just ignore it."

She looked very worried at that thought. "I know, we have." She paused for a breath before continuing. "I look at you and Ulrich and see how happy you make each other, and I really am happy for both of you..." She paused, taking another breath. "But sometimes... I still wish it was me." I felt a flash of jealousy, but she continued. "But I don't want to feel like that anymore. He's yours now, and I need to move on. I _want_ to move on. It's just hard to do after wanting to be with him for so long. That's why right now it doesn't even matter if I have feelings for Odd or not, either way he deserves better than my leftovers." The jealousy instantly melted away with how very profound and unselfish Sissi was being. She was probably confused and dealing with it the best she could. "But if that's how he feels, I don't want to break his heart either." Yeah, I knew what that was like. I thought about when I told Ulrich we could only be friends. I know it broke his heart and it broke mine to do it, but I still believe that it was the right thing to do at the time. She rested her chin on her knees for a moment before jerking her head back up and looking straight at me eyes wide! "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to put all of that on you, it just slipped out! I'm tired, it's late..."

I interrupted before she got too hysterical. "It okay! Really, I'm glad you told me!" I reassured her, "I've been wondering how you felt about Ulrich anymore, and it's nice to know for sure." She calmed down and rested her chin on her knees again. "I've been wondering something; why did you give up when we got together? It doesn't seem like the kind of thing you would have done back then."

"I don't really know for sure. Maybe because you two finally made it official, he was so polite about it. Maybe because he approached me rather than him denying any advance that I made. I know I was getting tired of being hurt by the constant rejection. Maybe all the above, or maybe some other reasons I'm not thinking about." She looked towards me again. "Anymore I think that you two are better together than me and him ever would've been anyway. Odd helped me see that." Once again, she surprised me. "After I get things figured out, I was hoping that maybe we could be friends too."

I had never thought that Sissi and I could ever be more than casual acquaintances at best, but tonight had been eye opening. She wanted to be friends with all of us, no strings attached. Having had no friends before following Ulrich to Lyoko, I knew what that was like. To top it off, I could see that she was really trying hard. She had gotten me the blanket and got Ulrich and me some very thoughtful gifts. She also apologized for being a pain in her card, and from everything we had talked about tonight, it sounded like she meant it! I looked at her again and noticed that she had started shivering, and that her jacket wasn't very thick. I laughed out loud at what I was about to do while shaking my head.

Sissi turned towards me, confusion written all over her face. "Umm... What's so funny?"

"This whole day has just been so weird!" I moved closer and offered her one side of the blanket. She gratefully wrapped it around her, and I was glad she grabbed the big one! "Not bad, just weird! You don't need to wait until you have things figured out for us to be friends, ok!" I think this was the first time I'd ever let myself actually relax while around Sissi. "And if you need to talk to somebody about Odd, give me a call. You probably want as few people as possible knowing what happened earlier, don't you?" This has definitely been a strange day... and I was still chuckling!

She blushed and smiled a little sheepishly. "Yeah, thanks. Odd and Aelita have always said you'd be really nice if we got to know each other a little better."

Being spoke of fondly by my friends made me smile, and them being referenced like that made me realize the level of friendship they both must have developed with Sissi. I wondered what else they had said, but I was interrupted by a wide yawn. "Looks like it's time for even me to get to sleep, you probably should too!"

Sissi rubbed her eyes a little. "Sounds good." She responded sleepily. She grabbed the blanket and I grabbed my cocoa mug. There wasn't much left in it, and it was cold anyway, so I dumped it out. We headed back to the living room trying to be quiet. I smiled at Aelita and Jeremy, still cuddled together, but Sissi stopped to stare at Odd. It was the same look Aelita gave Jeremy when she thought he wasn't looking. "I'm going to miss him over the break." She whispered.

"I'm going to miss Ulrich too."

"I'll bet," was her only acknowledgement. She didn't even flinch at the mention of Ulrich's name, she just kept staring at Odd. The day she will finally be able to let Ulrich go for good must be very close, and I was sure she was starting to have feelings for Odd whether she admitted it to herself or not. If that was true, then as things were now, they had a struggle ahead just like Ulrich and I did. Theirs would just be for different reasons, and I hoped for both their sakes it didn't last anywhere near as long.

"Night Sissi." Upon hearing her name, I saw her twitch. I think I startled her a little, and she blushed when she saw me watching her watch Odd. I walked closer and whispered, "I'm not going to tell anyone about anything we talked about, but I think he needs to know you can't." I gestured to Odd.

She glanced his way again for a moment before slowly looking away. "I know. Thanks for listening, Goodnight Yumi."

Maybe it wasn't such a bad idea inviting her here after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally part of chapter seven and that part was supposed to set the scene for this part, but it was too long for this story in my opinion, so it got cut into a two chapter event. That being said, as always, I hope you enjoyed it!


	9. Reunion

_Fourteen weeks, Early January_

_Reunion_

**POV Odd**

It was the Saturday evening before classes started again and I approached the dormitory building for the first time since I got back from my family. I was originally supposed to be back tomorrow, but for whatever reason there was a booking error, so my return flight ended up being today. Since international calling rates were ridiculous, I hadn't been able to talk to any of the group the entire break, and I kinda wanted to surprise anyone who was at Kadic right now.

Being 'home' was every bit as crazy as I remembered it but being the only boy, I had a room to myself. That was kinda nice because I was able to spend a lot of time there thinking about things. Most notable of those things was a certain someone. I remembered snuggling up to Sissi during the night at Yumi's. I wasn't quite conscious enough to really think about what I was doing at the time, and I didn't know how conscious she was when she put her arm over me, if at all. I also wasn't sure if I really liked her that way, but I had to admit that at the time it was very nice being that close. Far more important than any of that though, was that I didn't know how Sissi really felt. She must have woken up during the night and moved and we didn't have time to talk about it before I left for home. It certainly didn't help my confusion when my mom asked how things were doing between me and that 'lovely butterfly,' and I couldn't give a straight answer. I did manage to stammer out 'We're just friends,' but she didn't seem convinced.

I headed up to my room to drop off my luggage and saw that Ulrich wasn't there yet. He was supposed to be arriving tomorrow, so I left my room and turned towards Jeremy's. Him and Aelita were supposed to be here today. I briefly wondered if they had gotten any further in their relationship, but I doubted it. They were as hesitant as Ulrich and Yumi had been, but somehow, they didn't seem to be bothered by it. It was funny seeing them embarrassed from their own snuggling when they woke up at Yumi's though!

I knocked on his door. "It's open!" I heard him call back. I opened the door and we exchanged pleasantries. He told me that Aelita was also in her room unpacking. I ribbed him a little about the two of them spending vacation together, which he blushed profusely at. He also told me that they had already said hi to Sissi and then he ribbed me right back about me and her! That was certainly unexpected, and I denied any romantic accusations. He, like my mom, seemed unconvinced. After that bit of awkwardness, I told him I was going to say hi to the girls and left him to finish unpacking.

I headed upstairs and figured I should say hi to Aelita first. I was probably going to spend the rest of the evening with Sissi afterwards _,_ provided it wasn't too uncomfortable after... things. I knocked on Aelita's door. "Be there in a second!" When she came to the door she looked a little surprised, but pleasantly so. We exchanged a few stories about our vacations.

"So, have you visited Sissi yet? I'm sure she'll be happy to see you!"

"Not yet, I'm heading there next." I didn't sound anywhere near as enthusiastic about it as I wished I did.

She must have sensed that I was nervous about it. "Is something wrong?"

"No, not really..."

Now she was getting concerned. "Did something happen?"

I tried to keep a straight face. "Well, sort of, it's probably nothing though. Don't worry about it!"

She just looked at me skeptically. "If you say so Odd. Whatever it is, you should probably head over there and take care of it."

"I already planned on heading over after I left here."

"Well, don't let me keep you. Good luck."

"Thanks, see you later!" I left her room and stood in front of Sissi's door. I took a deep breath before knocking, and I heard movement inside.

The door opened and Sissi peered out and looked confused at first when she saw me. "Odd?" The confusion quickly fell away as she exclaimed again, "Odd!" And she wrapped me in a quick tight hug! It seemed like everything was going to be normal, which was a HUGE relief! She backed up a little and I could see her face was as bright as mine felt! "I thought you weren't supposed to be coming back until tomorrow!"

"There was a scheduling mix-up and my flight ended up being booked for today. I thought I'd make it a surprise!" I exclaimed through my grin. I stepped forwards, shutting the door behind me and we hugged again. This time it was longer, and I noticed she smelt of vanilla, probably from her body wash. I was wondering why I'd never paid any attention before when I found myself completely melting into her warm embrace. When we broke the hug, I came back to my senses, a little overwhelmed by what I had just felt. I tried to see if it looked like Sissi had felt anything similar, but she turned around too quickly. While her back was still turned, I shook my head a few times to clear it fully and sat down on the bed while she sat down at her vanity stool facing me.

We started to fill each other in on our vacations. I regaled her with stories of Della Robbia clan hijinks, and I was pleasantly surprised to hear that she'd made peace with Yumi and the two even had a little bit of phone time over the vacation.

During one of my stories, she grabbed a washcloth to remove her makeup, the start of her evening routine. I'd seen it quite a few times, and it was like she was removing the mask she showed the world. Letting me stay to see what was underneath felt like she was saying 'I trust you,' and I really liked that. While she was wiping her face, I picked up her hairbrush, intending to hand it to her for the next step. Instead, after she finished removing her makeup, I found myself drawn to her silky black hair and started to do it myself before I could think twice. The second the brush touched her head, her shoulders stiffened up and I froze.

"I told Yumi that I've been doing my best to get past Ulrich but moving on has been hard." I was confused and I looked at her in the mirror. On her face there was a look of pleading, and a hint of... fear? Then it hit me. She was telling me that she couldn't even think about considering an 'us' while she was still getting over Ulrich, no matter what either of us might feel. That made a lot of sense and my face must have shown when I understood because she relaxed slightly. I felt awful for not thinking about that earlier and considering exploring crossing the line between friends, and something more when it should have been so obvious that she couldn't.

I smiled warmly as I could and turned the brush around in my hand to give it to Sissi, handle first. "I understand, here."

She turned to look straight at me and when she moved to take the brush, also intentionally grabbed part of my hand in the process to hold it there for a moment. "Thank you, Odd." Her shoulders relaxed, and the so did the look on her face. She let go of my hand looking extremely grateful and relieved that I understood without needed to talk about it directly.

I was grateful too, but for other reasons. I knew where we stood with each other again as best friends, and only that. I smiled widely back at her while I did my best to quash any of the thoughts of potential romance, including the memory of falling back asleep while cuddling. "That's what friends are for!" I exclaimed before finishing up my story.

The awkwardness was thankfully gone now, and we finished up the evening, and our stories. It was time for me to head out, and we gave our hugs goodbye for the night. The scent of vanilla filled my nostrils once again and I felt myself start to sink into her arms, just like earlier. Before I completely lost myself again, she pulled away. I wasn't sure yet, but I think I just made it awkward again.

As I was leaving, I started thinking about what exactly happened back there. It wasn't until I realized that I felt slightly disappointed that we couldn't explore the idea of being together that I knew for sure that I definitely liked her as more than a friend. A little anyway, I wasn't too shaken up about being turned down. Oh, well. I guess right now she needs a best friend, not a boyfriend, and with Ulrich spending more time with Yumi she'd become my best friend too (not that I begrudged him of that, way to go man!). If she wanted to avoid talking about it directly, then she must not feel that she can talk about it for now and I didn't want to push it. No one else needed to know either. I finished walking to my room resolving to keep my feelings entirely to myself from now on until further notice. I hoped it wasn't too late though and everything would be normal the next time I came, but somehow, I didn't think so. I groaned as I thought that this must be how Ulrich felt after Yumi told him they could be 'friends, that's all...' Well, sort of.


	10. Reconciliation

_Seventeen weeks, Late January_

_Reconciliation_

**POV Sissi**

It was Wednesday evening again, and Odd and I were together at the desk in my room doing homework for Ms. Mayers' math class... and struggling. Lately, it seemed like I was struggling with a lot of things. It was like I told Yumi, my life had turned upside-down. Many of the things I had cared about before, I didn't anymore; things I didn't care about, I did now. Then there were still other things that I cared about for different reasons than I used to! Even though I liked myself a lot more, and seemed to be liked more by everyone else, I still felt lost a lot of the time. Now was one of those times. What made it worse was that things hadn't been the same with Odd since he got back from winter break. I don't think we'd even hugged each other after his first day back. The way he had kinda melted into me scared me a little. We still enjoyed spending time together, a lot for that matter, but it wasn't the same and I really missed how completely comfortable we had been with each other.

"That's it, I'm done!" I exclaimed rubbing my temples. "I just can't concentrate anymore." I just had too many other things on my mind to focus on math!

Odd just shook his head. "I was just about to give up too. What would we ever do without our resident geniuses' help!"

I snorted. "Probably the same thing we used to do!" He cocked his eyebrow in my direction. " _Fail_!" We both laughed wryly, knowing it was true. Tomorrow was Thursday so I would be able get help from get Aelita.

He started packing up his homework. "Well, at least we gave an honest effort!"

"I guess." I walked over to my vanity and sat on the stool looking into the mirror. I couldn't shake the feeling that I didn't know the person looking back at me anymore.

In the corner of my eye, I saw him swivel his chair to face me. "Are you ok?"

"Yeah, I guess so." I said flatly, not looking at him. I knew I wasn't fooling anyone.

He got up, walked over and put his hand on my shoulder. "Do you want to talk about it? You know we can talk about anything."

We both knew that wasn't entirely true. I've known he's had at least some feelings for me since the Christmas sleepover. I just couldn't see him that way, especially not when sometimes I still longed for Ulrich. He had willingly and cheerfully set aside those feelings to continue being my best friend though, and though I loved him for it (platonically, of course!), the easy comfort we had developed with each other just wasn't there anymore. We also had the unspoken agreement that I wouldn't pry into the group's secrets, so he wouldn't have to lie to me. I knew the others did, and the look on Odd's face often gave it away. Not being trusted after all this time was starting to hurt; after all I was trying my best to be a good friend to all of them. At least our unspoken agreements seemed fair-ish. We had one topic we didn't talk about for my sake, and one for his.

"Can I ask you something?" There was something that I wanted to ask about, and thankfully it wasn't off-limits. The ironic part is that it was the thing about myself that I used to be the most confident and outspoken about, but I just didn't know anymore.

"Yeah, sure!"

I grabbed a washcloth off the vanity, buried my face in it and groaned loudly. This was going to be embarrassing. I pulled the washcloth from my face and looked at Odd. "Do you think I'm pretty?" Odd looked at me and burst out laughing! I was hurt that he thought it was funny. "Odd, I'm being serious!"

He barely managed to squeeze out, "look in the mirror!"

I glanced at my vanity mirror and barely stifled a giggle myself! When I put my face in the washcloth, I smeared my makeup everywhere, and now I looked like a deranged clown! No wonder he was laughing! "Ok fine! I'm only forgiving you because that IS funny!"

"Wash it off, and then we can talk. I can't take you seriously with you looking like that!"

Fair enough! I wiped the smeared mess off and looked back at him. "Better?

He eventually calmed his laughter. "Better." He took a deep breath to finish off any lingering chuckles. "Much better. Yes Sissi, you are very pretty." I smiled a little, but the feelings I knew he had for me meant that his judgment was probably a little biased. "Though I'm surprised to hear you asking that. You were always saying that you were 'the prettiest girl in school!'"

I chuckled. "Yeah well, you know me well enough to know that I had a lot of false bravado."

He smiled at me fondly. "Sissi, you are every bit as pretty as you used to claim to be." He stopped and thought for a second, which had me a little worried. "But I think you hide your face too much."

While I liked the compliment, the other part was confusing. "What does that mean?"

He was very hesitant to answer for some reason. "I... think you normally wear too much makeup." I looked at him, confused. He looked torn for some reason until he seemed to come to a decision. He smiled widely then got up, and I was shocked as he started rifling through my vanity!

"What are you doing!?" If it was anyone else, I would have slapped them, I almost slapped HIM for that matter!

He stopped for a moment to look back at me. "What? Don't you trust me?" He said still grinning.

It took a second to realize what my answer to that question really was. I'd never thought about it before! I chuckled slightly then smiled, shaking my head in slight disbelief before responding. "Yeah, I guess I do, but I have no idea why!" I teased, then I backed away from the vanity to give him more room to go looking around. "And if you turn me into a clown, I'll smack you so silly you'll be having flashbacks to the day you spent apologizing to all your old girlfriends!"

He laughed and looked at a tube of mascara before handing it to me, "I could probably put this on you, but I think you'd do a better job!" I laughed just thinking about it, then took the tube and applied some to my lashes. When I was done, he turned me away from the mirror. "No more looking until I'm done!"

"I can't believe..."

"Hold that thought!" He interrupted, handing me a tube of lipstick after going through several colors. He didn't even pick one of the fun bright ones! I sighed and shook my head before obediently putting it on.

"I can't believe I'm letting you give me a makeover! I'm going to regret this..."

"No, you won't! Eyes closed please!" I did as I was told and I think it felt like he was applying some blush, but I wasn't sure. "Alright, done!" He said with triumph. I was confused, no foundation, no concealer, primer, contour. He hardly used anything!

He turned me back around to face the mirror and I just sighed. For all of Odd's hype, I was disappointed, but not surprised. I looked... nice... sort of, but very plain. "Odd, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but this is nothing special." At least he didn't turn me into a clown.

He looked directly over my shoulder into the mirror at me. "Hmm, you're right. There is definitely something missing."

I heaved another sigh, "there's a lot more to makeUUUHHAAAAAAHHHHHHH" I squealed and laughed hysterically as he started tickling my sides! I tried pleading with him to stop between squeaks and giggles before deciding to counterattack! I managed to turn around and pin him to the ground face down tickling his sides until he cried out for mercy. "There! How do you like it!"

Panting, he quickly pointed at the mirror, "now look!" I turned around, and before my jaw dropped in surprise, I saw the incredible difference that a genuine, excited smile could make. "You were having fun. You really don't need much from all that." He pointed at all the cosmetics on my vanity. I sat down and tried to recreate the look but was having a hard time. While I was distracted, Odd was looking in the mirror from behind me again and started putting his arms around my shoulders. He hadn't done that since before the break, and I felt my whole body stiffen up. "Relax, I'm not going for a rematch." He said with a chuckle and a grin.

That wasn't why I was tense. I looked at him in the mirror nervously for a few seconds. "Odd...?"

His grin faded until he looked sadly into the mirror back at me. "I miss how we were." I didn't know what to say. I did too, but that still didn't make the knots in my stomach go away. "I think know what you're afraid of." My breath hitched in my throat for a second as I wondered if he was going to bring up one of our unspoken topics. "But you really don't need to worry about that. I just want my best friend back, that's all. I miss her, and I miss how easy it was to be with each other. I want that back." I missed him too, but I was worried about how we could go back to the way things were while I knew he had feelings for me. He had reached out to me though, and now I had a decision to make that might affect the nature of our friendship for a long time to come.

...

...

...

Eventually I decided wanted things back just as much as he did. I closed my eyes, took and held a deep breath, and put my head back into his shoulder, just like we used to. When I let the breath out, it was like the tension left with it and I felt myself relax completely. It had been far too long. "I'm happy to have my best friend back." I heard him whisper.

I felt a wide smile creep onto my face. "Yeah, me too."

"Hey Sissi."

"Yeah."

"You should look in the mirror again." I cracked my eyes open. My reflection sort of reminded me of after Odd tickled me. It wasn't the same, but I looked happy. Happy to have my best friend back, and happy to have my best friendship back. I liked the person looking back at me. "Can I ask you a question?"

I raised my eyebrows at his reflection. "I guess it is your turn, sure."

"Have you felt like you've been sort of lost lately?"

It was like he had read my mind earlier, and I frowned. "Yeah, kinda." I was a little upset that he had ruined the moment.

"I thought so, and I've been thinking."

Now he had me curious. "About what?"

"I think that maybe you've been trying to change too much from how you were."

I jerked my head off his shoulder in surprise. "But I was terrible! I don't want to be _her_ again."

"Not all of it. Sure, you could be a pain, but you were also witty, sassy, fun loving, playful, persevering, kinda flirty, confident, shall I go on...?"

"N-No, that's okay." I flopped my head back on his shoulder. I had never thought of it that way. I had just been trying to 'out with the old, in with the new' everything, and I was losing myself in the process.

"It's just like your drawing." I glanced at the sketches that I had on the wall. Odd given me a few more lessons after the first one, and the improvement was noticeable. "You never needed to change everything. You only needed some fine tuning, but if you really think about it, we all do. I know I'm a better person because of you." He smiled at me in the mirror looking like he was playing back memories in his head. "Besides, you don't need to have everything figured out right now, I certainly don't! So, you don't need to try so hard that you forget to enjoy life." He was right. No wonder I had felt lost. Things may have changed, and I might see things differently, but I was still me. He glanced at the clock and saw it was time to go. As he stood up and backed away, I heard him whisper, "life is beautiful, and so are you." I'm didn't think he meant for me to hear the second part, but I think that just made me appreciate him saying it even more.

He turned and started to head for the door. I jerked my head in his direction before I got up and followed quickly. "Odd wait!" He turned around and I flung my arms around him wrapping him in a big hug, the kind I knew we both missed. I felt him tuck his face into the crook of my neck, melting into it the same way he did when he got back from the break. It still made me a little nervous at first, but I had missed this too much to care. The nerves quickly went away entirely though, and now that I wasn't afraid of it, I found myself nuzzling right back into him. I couldn't seem to remember why it had scared me so much because this was wonderful. "Thanks," I said. Thanks for reaching out to me... again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a lot of fun with this one, and the idea of the tickle fight in the middle had been stuck in my mind since the beginning. Odd totally let her win so she would be the one smiling at the end!


	11. Valentine's Day

_Twenty weeks, Mid February_

_Valentine's Day_

**POV Odd**

It was Sunday morning and I was headed towards Sissi's room. It also happened to be Valentine's Day, and I had gotten her a black and pink bracelet with a little heart motif on it. She seemed to really like when I played guitar for her, so I also I recorded myself playing some acoustic stuff and burned them to a CD. It wasn't much, but I didn't have a lot of money. Anything too extravagant might have made her nervous anyway. After our awkward phase a few weeks ago, that was the last thing I wanted to do!

I was thinking about her while I walked, and how she really took to heart and given a lot of thought about the things I said about the good qualities of how she used to be. She had started to let herself be snarky and teasing again, but without any of the old mean spiritedness. The kind, caring side of her that we used to only sometimes see during XANA attacks really started coming out too, and she was liked more by the others almost daily. I think the final turning point for Ulrich was when Sissi made fun of him and Yumi heading out 'to go study.' They just awkwardly stared at her until she exclaimed 'What! I can tease you guys too you know!' Then we all laughed, even Yumi and Ulrich, despite them both turning beet red. She really was becoming the best Sissi she could be. I remember when she asked what 'my type' was and responding 'playful, flirty, with the right amount of sass.' She was every bit of that, and so much more. I'd liked her for a several weeks already, but now I was completely head over heels for her. I wasn't sure how much longer I could keep these feelings to myself.

I arrived at her room and knocked on the door.

"Just a Seco..." ' _BANG_ ' "OWWW!"

I quickly opened the door and ran in. "Sissi! Are you..."?

I froze...

She froze...

my eyes about popped out of my head, and my cheeks were suddenly on fire as I saw a small amount of pink fabric, and a LOT of skin.

"GET OOOOOUUUUUUUUUT! OUT, OUT, OUT, OUT, OUT, OUT, OUT!" She grabbed the closest thing to her and whipped it at me, thankfully it was a pillow. I bolted out as fast as I could and quickly shut the door, slumping to the ground against it. I couldn't believe I just walked in on her changing... so much for things not being awkward anymore.

Aelita came out of her room. "What's going on? I heard Sissi shouting, is everything ok?

"I'd rather not talk about it..." was my only reply. The color on my cheeks, look on my face, and my reaction must have somehow tipped her off to what just happened because she started giggling uncontrollably! I would have liked to have told her to be quiet, but I was way too embarrassed to say anything at all.

Just then Sissi's door opened from behind me, and I almost fell backwards. I felt Sissi grab the back of my collar and pull me to my feet. "Come on, get in here!" Next, she pointed at a still giggling Aelita. "And you! Not a word to anyone!" She pushed me into the room before noticing the box with her bracelet and CD case on the ground, picked them up, handed them to me, then shut the door.

As I waited nervously in the corner for my imminent and well-deserved demise, Sissi flopped on the bed, and started literally rolling around laughing her head off! Between laughs be barely managed to gasp out "YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN YOUR FACE!" While I just stood there, dumbfounded, and happy that I wasn't currently being murdered.

When her laughter died down, I finally dared to speak. "So, you're not mad at me then?"

She shook her head, lightly chuckling again. "No, I'm not. You didn't see anything you wouldn't have seen at the pool anyway."

I could not have been more relieved. "No awkwardness either...?" I was pushing my luck, and I knew it.

Sissi just laughed again. "We already tried that once and hated it, remember!?" I was wrong, NOW I couldn't have been more relieved. "After the shock wore off, I realized you rushed in because you thought I was hurt, it was sweet. I'm okay though, I just stubbed my toe." She smiled adorably, and I felt my heart melt. I just hoped it didn't show too much.

She rolled onto her stomach and propped herself up on her elbows. Her expression and posture went from adorable to mischievous, and I knew something snarky was coming. "So Odd... enjoy the show?"

"Uhhh..." I didn't see THAT coming and I froze in shock, wide eyed and slack jawed. I had been so embarrassed for walking in that I hadn't even thought about the details of what I walked in on, though despite my shock, I was pretty sure that wasn't the point of the question! The look on her face made it perfectly clear that she was quite amused by how flustered I was. When I finally shook myself out of it, I somehow managed to evenly respond, "you're a very pretty young lady, and I'm not comfortable saying anything else."

She just laughed yet again. "Well, I hope you've got a good memory because you're not seeing it AGAIN, HA!" Then she stuck her tongue out at me 'PPPPPBBBBBBTTTTTTTHHHHHHH!'

I chuckled, feeling very relieved. If she felt comfortable enough to make fun of me, then everything must be ok. I looked down and saw the box and CD case in my hand and realized that I had almost forgotten about it! "Hey Sissi, these are for you. It's not much, but happy Valentine's Day!"

She turned over and sat up. "You didn't have to do that!"

"That's ok, I wanted to." I sat down next to her, handing her the box and case.

Opening it she exclaimed, "oh that's cute!" And proceeded to put it on, then caught me by surprise by kissing my cheek. I felt my face getting warm and I absently touched my cheek. "Thanks, Odd!" She said while admiring the bracelet. "How about this one?" She asked, looking at the CD.

"How about you put it in and find out?" I said with a smirk. She popped it in and hit play. "That's you!" She exclaimed and sat back down.

"You always did seem to like my playing."

"I love it." She smiled at first, but then looked back at me and started to look a little sad.

"What's wrong?"

"I didn't think to get you anything. I'm sorry..."

I smiled slightly at the sentiment. "That's okay, you didn't have to." I reassured her. It didn't work very well, so I just put my arm around her and rubbed her shoulder for a bit while she sat looking like she was thinking for a few minutes.

Suddenly, her face brightened up as she looked back at me. "Hey Odd, I've got an idea! Turn your back towards me."

"Umm... okay." Though confused, I did as I was told.

She put her hands on my shoulders. "I've never done this before, so let me know if it's any good."

"Ohhhhhhh..." I involuntarily closed my eyes and moaned as I felt her thumbs kneading into the muscles of my shoulders, upper back, and up into my neck.

"Any good?" I heard Sissi ask. I thought it was a silly question because I was in heaven, and I barely managed to nod. After about ten minutes, she stopped. "Ok, I can't do any more, my hands are tired."

"That's ok, that was incredible!" I purred, and out of sheer relaxation I started to lean back with Sissi gently guiding me until I was laying down completely. My eyes were still shut when I realized that my head was resting in Sissi's lap. If getting the massage was heaven, then this was a close second. Unfortunately, I was also afraid of how Sissi would take it. Was this too much or was it simply not a big deal. She had helped me lay down here, so she couldn't be too bothered with it, right? I was pulled out of my reverie when a weight settled on my chest. Startled, I opened my eyes and looked down to see her hand gently resting on me. When I looked up, I felt my heart leap. She looked neither indifferent, nor nervous. Instead, she was gazing down at me with a look of affection, a gentle smile playing across her lips. I had wanted her to look at me like that for so long, and I felt a smile creep to my face as I stared into her gorgeous dark grey eyes. I didn't dare to do anything else right now and risk ruining the moment, but I was going to savor it for as long as she would let me. As it turned out was willing to let me lie here for a quite a while. When I eventually worked up the courage, she even let me put my hand over hers.

"Happy Valentine's Day Odd."

Best Valentine's Day present ever.

She slowly started to bring her other hand over towards my face as if about to start stroking my cheek, and I waited in anticipation.

'Knock knock.' "Is everything okay in there?" Fate, in the form of Aelita, had other plans and the spell was broken. I sat up immediately, and Sissi got up to get the door. I felt my cheeks burning and figured that Sissi's probably were too, and Aelita was bound to notice. Unfortunately, if we tried to wait out the blush, then she would be suspicious of that! I just hoped she would keep quiet.

I stepped up next to Sissi as she opened the door, "Hi Aelita, what's up?" I glanced over and saw that she was indeed blushing, probably even more than I was. That made sense, I had admitted to myself that I loved her some time ago, whereas earlier might have caught her off guard.

"I just wanted to make sure everything was okay, and that Odd was still alive." We both blushed even more remembering that I walked in on her. Aelita put on that knowing smile of hers, "but it seems like everything is fine here. I'm heading to lunch, are you going to come too? Or perhaps you two would just like to be left alone for a while." The suggestive overtones in her voice was obvious.

"Yeah, we'll be down shortly." Somehow Sissi was able keep it together despite how flustered she looked. It was certainly more than I could manage!

"Alright, I'll see you guys there!" Then she left with Sissi closing the door after her.

We both heaved sighs of relief at the same time and chuckled before looking at each other for a moment and I started getting nervous again. "Sissi?"

"Yes Odd?"

"About earlier, are we cool? I mean with..." I tried to gesture indicating everything that happened, and somehow, she managed to understand.

She smiled and laughed a little before putting her hand on my shoulder, not seeming to be bothered by any of it. "Yeah Odd, we're fine. Just don't go expecting 'shoulder rubs' to be a normal thing, happy Valentine's Day!" That calmed my nerves, but she clearly meant for 'shoulder rubs' to also mean everything that happened to go with it this time. The memory of the way she looked at me when my head was on her lap finally gave me hope that she could eventually fully return my feelings, and that made my heart soar. She didn't seem ready to do anything about it now, which was fine. I respected and cared about her way too much to pressure her into anything, and I wasn't about to rush this and risk ruining what we already had. No matter how I felt about her romantically, our friendship had was still more important. I thought about asking her how things were with getting past Ulrich, but I cringed at the thought of her admitting that she could still want someone else. It was just too much for me to handle right now. I did the best I could to put that out of my mind for now and just ask another time, at a less tender moment.

She pulled her hand off my shoulder. "Now let's go get some lunch!"

Until now I hadn't realized that we missed breakfast, and the thought of eating did a good job of distracting me from my thoughts of how Sissi might still feel about Ulrich! "Sounds good, I'm starving!" We headed out and I felt a new spring in my step as I smiled over at Sissi and was delighted when she smiled back with a slight blush.

She stopped walking for a second and I did too. She got that snarky glint in her eye before she got up close and whispered into my ear. "Just don't ever walk in on me on purpose. I'd rather not have to figure out where to hide the body!" After she pulled away, she stuck her tongue out at me again. "PPBBTTHHH"

She was clearly teasing me again, so I laughed as we kept walking. We were still best friends, and still fully comfortable with each other, even after everything that had happened this morning. I would have been able to happy with just that, but I finally had some sign that we might be able to be more. For that, I was ecstatic, and I felt I could keep my feelings to myself for a little longer if I had too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These chapters keep getting more and more fun to write! The idea of Odd walking in on was another one of those Ideas that had been with me since before starting the story! As always, I hope you guys liked it!


	12. Growth and (Mis)Trust

_Twenty-three weeks, early March_

_Growth and (Mis)trust_

**POV Jeremy**

"Where are they? It's not like Odd to be late for dinner." Commented Ulrich

"That's true, as long as they're here before it's over. You guys have got some serious studying to do, and I'd like to get as much time in as possible." It was Thursday and that meant it was study night. Normally Sissi and Aelita studied together, while I helped Odd and Ulrich, but this evening we were all going to get together to study for midterms. Yumi had her own midterms to study for, and she was smart enough that she didn't need the help anyway. Odd and Sissi, however, were missing dinner for some reason, which was weird given how much Odd loved to eat!

"I'll bet they're in her room." Chimed in Aelita. She was probably right, but it still wasn't like Odd to miss dinner. "Let's just stop by before heading to the library. It's not like it's far."

We finished our dinners but Odd and Sissi never showed up, and for whatever reason, we couldn't get hold of either of their phones. "Alright, let's see if we can find the two lovebirds." Joked Ulrich, and we headed towards Sissi's room.

"You know they're just friends, right?" I reminded him.

"That's true, for now." Aelita said with a giggle. It sounded like she knew something that we didn't. Given that she was Sissi's usual tutor, and her good friend, it wouldn't surprise me.

"They certainly spend enough time together that they may as well be dating!" I chimed in again.

"Yeah, kinda like you and Aelita!" I felt my cheeks burn from Ulrich's teasing, and I shut up immediately. I glanced over at Aelita and her face was also beet red. I liked her a lot, but I yet to get up the courage to tell her. I had another reason too, but I didn't want to think about it right now.

"Hey Ulrich, can I ask you something?" Aelita asked, and I was grateful to her for changing the subject.

"Yeah, sure."

"I think we can all agree that having Sissi around is actually pretty fun, and she really is a good friend, right?" I thought I knew where she was going with this.

"I never thought I'd say it, but yeah."

"If Sissi had always been like this, and you'd never met Yumi, do you think you would have ever gone out with her?" Yep, she went right where I thought she was going. I laughed while Ulrich sounded like he choked. Aelita just smiled at Ulrich smugly for turning the tables on him before giving me a wink, which made me blush again.

To his credit, after recovering he actually did give it some thought before answering. "Probably not. Even if we did, it wouldn't have worked out. We're just not right for each other. Honestly, I hope that her and Odd do end up together. They're a solid match and they'd be good for each other."

"They already are good for each other! She's certainly come a long way." I agreed with Ulrich.

"She's not the only one, Odd has too. Who'd have thought that he would ever go and apologize to all his old girlfriends for being a jerk!?" Aelita reminded us. "I saw him get slapped six times, and I know there was a lot more than that! But he never gave up, never complained, and never brought it up to anyone else. I had to find out what was going on from the girls, and most of them didn't know he had talked to anyone besides them. I was very impressed!"

I remembered a conversation I had with Odd late one night a couple weeks ago.

" _Hey Jeremy, can we talk for a minute?" Odd stood in my doorway looking uncharacteristically timid._

" _Sure, come on in." I sat down in my computer chair and swivel to face him. He was looking at the floor. "What's up?"_

" _You remember when Aelita and I..." his mouth opened and shut a few times like he was having a hard time saying whatever it was. "... had to throw Hervé and Nicolas off the trail at the factory?"_

_I scowled at him for bringing that up. "Yeah, what about it?" I growled at him._

_He didn't look up, but quietly said, "I'm sorry."_

" _What?"_

_He continued softly; his voice somewhat broken. "I know how you feel about Aelita, and I knew it then too. I thought it would be funny to get you all flustered and then even made fun of you for it afterwards. That wasn't right, so... I'm sorry."_

_I was grateful for the apology, but also confused. "That was almost a year ago, why are you bringing this up now?"_

_He looked up at me for the first time since he walked in. He just looked sad. "I... think I have a better idea of how you felt while that was happening, and I'm sorry for doing that to you for... no good reason. I'm sure we could have come up with a better plan than that."_

_I was still confused. As he turned around to walk out, it dawned on me! "Sissi still has feelings for Ulrich, doesn't she?" I asked as he reached the door. It was obvious that Odd really liked the girl. Even I could see it in the way he looked at her._

_He took hold of the doorknob and squeezed it as hard enough for his arm to start to shake before he managed to croak out, "Yeah, a little." Then without giving me time to say anything else, he quickly opened the door and left._

I felt bad for him, but if he was learning to feel remorse for the things he'd done, and to be more considerate, then it was probably going to be a good thing in the long run. It was a huge step forward for him.

We had just finished climbing the stairs to the girl's dorm hallway and stopped right in front of Sissi's room. Ulrich was about to knock, but then stopped himself before putting his ear to the door. His eyes shot open wide in horror, and he pulled away from the door.

"What is it?" Aelita asked.

"Just listen." Ulrich whispered.

Aelita and I quietly put our ears to the door.

' _Mmmmmmm that's good!'_ I heard Sissi moan.

' _Mmm, I know right!'_ Odd moaned in response.

We both pulled our heads away from the door and I probably mirrored Ulrich's expression. Aelita just looked confused. "Ok, so what?" Ulrich and I looked at each other, then back to Aelita and we both blushed realizing one of us was going to explain aspects of a certain... activity... I was extremely grateful when Ulrich stepped up and whispered in Aelita's ear, relieving me from that duty. She jerked back from Ulrich, "NO WAY!" We both shushed her at the same time. "They're still just friends... for now..." she thought for a moment as if remembering something, then blushed. "Well, maybe not..."

"It certainly sounds like that's what's going on, doesn't it!" I blurted, probably louder than I should have.

Aelita gave me a dumb look. "How am I supposed to know what _that_ sounds like!" A sudden realization dawned on her face. "How do _YOU_ know what that sounds like!"

I blushed even more, "the walls at my parent's house aren't as thick as I sometimes wish they were." I answered with embarrassment. Aelita seemed satisfied with the answer though.

We all put our ears to the door again and heard Sissi first again.

' _Ahhhh. Why on earth did I hold out on this for so long!'_

' _I dunno, beats me! That was good though!'_

' _Yeah, it certainly was!'_

"Ok, this is too much, I'm going in!" Said Ulrich.

"Ulrich NO!" Aelita tried to stop him, but it was too late, and Ulrich barged into the room.

"DO YOU KNOCK!?" Shouted Sissi while I peered into the room over Ulrich's shoulder. Odd and Sissi were sitting on the bed, both fully clothed. Odd was holding a white cardboard fold-up box and a plastic fork and Sissi was glaring at Ulrich.

Odd looked down at the box, then over at us. "You know, I'd offer you guys some of this, but it's all gone. There's this Chinese food place down the road that has the BEST sweet and sour pork!"

"I completely wrecks my diet, but it was _really_ good! Odd's been trying to get me to try it for weeks!" It all made sense now, and Sissi was still glaring at Ulrich.

"Uhh..." Ulrich was dumbfounded. "Sorry, I just thought..." he looked at the floor and blushed as he realized just how stupid barging in was regardless of what was actually going on!

Odd and Sissi looked at Ulrich, both obviously confused by how embarrassed he was getting. "You just thought what?" Odd asked, and Ulrich just got redder.

"Let's just say that we could hear moaning outside your door." Aelita hinted.

Odd and Sissi looked at Aelita, then each other, still confused, then back at Ulrich. Odd's eyes shot open wide as he figured out what Aelita meant and started laughing hysterically. "They. Thought. You and me..." he managed to wheeze out between laughs. When Sissi still didn't get it, he made a very obvious gesture with both hands and Sissi's jaw dropped!

"Ulrich Stern, you are horrible!" She shouted in a mix of shock and amusement. "First, despite what I KNOW you've all been saying lately, we are STILL just friends, that's all! Second, even if we were dating, that is still NOT happening! Third, if that WAS happening, you're horrible for barging in here while THINKING _that_ was going on!" She started shaking her head while laughing, and Odd had fallen backwards on the bed and was clutching his stomach he was laughing so hard. Meanwhile, Ulrich did his best to disappear into the wall, and wasn't very successful.

"You know, Odd learned not to barge in a couple of weeks ago!' Aelita started cryptically.

Sissi's eyes got really wide for some reason. "Oh no you don't!" She lunged off the bed with Odd right behind her, and they grabbed Aelita by the arms. They flung her onto the bed and Sissi started tickling Aelita's sides while Odd held her arms down. I tried to help get her get out, but my efforts were rewarded with a leg sweep from Sissi. Clearly, she was still practicing Pencak Silat!

"You promise to not say anything?!" Sissi demanded of Aelita while I painfully slunk away.

"Ok, ok, I promise!" Aelita managed to squeeze out between gasps and giggles. Odd and Sissi pulled away. "Honestly, you two are worse than the scyphozoa!"

"Oh, come on, it wasn't THAT bad!" Exclaimed Odd.

"The skiffy-what?" Said Sissi, quite confused. The whole room quickly got silent as Odd, Ulrich, and I kept looking between Aelita and Sissi.

"I-It's nothing." Ulrich managed to stammer out.

"A scyphozoa is a jellyfish." I added, hoping to defuse the situation a little. It definitely didn't work.

Sissi looked at Odd, who looked back at her with the saddest look that I'd ever seen on his face. He turned to us. "Just go on ahead to the library, we'll catch up."

Sissi's face fell too. "Odd, you go ahead too."

"But..."

"Please, Odd. I just need a couple minutes to myself." I couldn't tell who looked more hurt, Odd or Sissi.

We all piled out of Sissi's room. I looked at Odd and it looked like he had tears forming. "You guys go on ahead, I need to grab my books from my room." He said glumly and ran off quickly.

"I'll bet that's the first time she's ever kicked him out." Aelita hissed before she started to walk away quickly, and we followed. "She's getting really tired of being lied to. She's not stupid, and she knows that we were up to something while we were fighting XANA." Ulrich and I murmured agreement. "It's obvious that Odd likes Sissi, maybe even loves her, and I'm pretty sure that she feels the same way, but how would they ever be able to make things work if Sissi feels like Odd can't trust her." She let that sink in for a moment. "And I can imagine how Odd feels having to hide it from her." Then she muttered bitterly under her breath, "she's my friend too, and I'm really tired of lying to her." I didn't like the idea of telling Sissi about Lyoko, but I trusted Aelita. Seeing the pain on Odd's face earlier was also awful, and this on top of Sissi's lingering feelings for Ulrich made me feel even worse for him.

We finished the trip to the library in silence and got our books out. Odd and Sissi ended up meeting us there only a few minutes behind us, but apart from each other. Both of their eyes were a little red and watery. While we were studying Odd kept glancing at Sissi with a look that said, 'I'm sorry,' and Sissi kept sadly looking back at him. It was probably the most depressing study session I'd ever been through.

After the study, and after lights out, I couldn't sleep. I just kept thinking about what Aelita said about Odd and Sissi. I knew I would feel awful if I was keeping a big secret like Lyoko from Aelita. I sighed and turned over. I guess if Odd decided to bring it up, I would be willing to discuss it seriously and fairly. Thankfully, that seemed to put my mind at ease enough to drift off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So not a lot of Sissi or Odd in this one, but I felt that I needed to put in a little something depicting how the rest of the group felt about Sissi. Still, as Always, I hope you all liked it.


	13. Anxiety

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter takes place the day after 'What Came Next 2' ends. If you haven't read that one, or don't remember it, I would recommend it otherwise you'll probably feel like you're missing something. I also edited the original story for better continuity with this one. Reading 'What Came Next 1' isn't necessary.

_Twenty Five Weeks, Late March_

_Anxiety_

It was about 5:00 on Sunday morning, and I couldn't sleep. My mind was reeling with the events and revelations of the last two days.

_There was a virtual world within a supercomputer called Lyoko_. Ok that's crazy, but I suppose I could deal with that.

_Aelita was imprisoned in Lyoko for over ten years and should be in her mid-twenties by now. The group had also been fighting for her freedom for a long time before she came to Kadic._ That was a bit crazier, but ok. It did explain why she was accepted by the group like she was an old friend. Put simply, she WAS an old friend!

_My friends had been fighting an evil A.I. called Xana, who had been repeatedly attacking the real world_. That's really scary... but it was gone now. No worries there.

_The supercomputer could turn back time and the only ones who remembered any of it were my friends._ This one bothered me. I didn't like that my memory had been wiped so many times, and the fact that I was still vulnerable to these 'return trips' didn't sit well with me at all. It did explain the group's almost psychic ability to anticipate things the way they sometimes did. Even if I didn't like it, a lot of things made more sense now, and there was nothing I could do about things and memories that had already been wiped. Though if they ever did turn the super computer back on, I would make sure that I was getting scanned in immediately. No more memory wipes for me!

_Odd Della Robbia is my boyfriend._ Sometimes the mind is strange. This should be the easiest thing to accept on the whole list, but for some reason it's the one that I can't quite seem to wrap my head around. We had been best friends for months and had definitely been drifting towards being more lately. I knew that he wanted this for a long time and looking back I certainly couldn't deny the attraction I had been feeling towards him for the last few weeks either, especially since Valentine's Day. However, I kinda wanted to talk to him about it first, but in all the excitement about being trusted about Lyoko, my non-verbal confession to him, and the couple of kisses that we shared, that kinda fell by the wayside and we just jumped right into an official relationship. I think we had gotten a little carried away, and now I was starting to get a little freaked out!

_And if you need to talk to somebody about Odd, give me a call._

Yumi's words from months ago popped in my head. I look at my clock again to see if it's too early to call her. 5:27, Darn. Well, she did say that she didn't sleep much. I called her hoping that I didn't wake her and hoping even more that she would pick up!

"Unnngggg, hello?"

I guess she had been asleep. "Hi Yumi, I'm sorry if I woke you..."

"Sissi? Do you have any idea what time it is?" She asked with a groan.

"I'm sorry, but I needed to talk, and I didn't know who else to call."

"Don't you talk to Odd about everything?" She sounded grumpy, but her irritation was quite understandable.

"It's about Odd..." There was silence on the line. "Yumi?"

"Can it wait until later?"

"I'm really sorry! I wouldn't have called this early at all, but I'm starting to panic!" I was starting to sound frantic.

I heard her sigh. "Ok, I'll leave a note for my parents, and I'll be right there, but if I need to take a nap, it's going to be your bed I'm stealing!"

"Thanks, Yumi." I relaxed a little knowing that she was coming. We still weren't all that close, but Odd had been right when he said that she would do anything for her friends. I trusted her, and I felt very grateful that I could count myself amongst them.

About twenty minutes later, I heard some light knocking on my door. "Come in."

As Yumi walked through the door, I could see dark circles under her barely open eyes. She had a large to-go mug filled with what smelled like coffee. It made me feel bad about calling her over. She walked past me and slumped into my desk chair without even saying anything. She took a sip of her coffee and gave a small contented sigh before turning around and facing me. "Nothing like double strength, French press coffee on an early morning. So, what seems to be the problem? You two looked really happy yesterday." It looked like she was trying really hard to not be moody, and I really appreciated it.

"I don't know, everything just happened so quickly. I was hoping Odd and I could maybe talk about things first. When he came to bring me down to Jeremy's room after you guys agreed to trust me about Lyoko, he was so excited that he kissed me, then I got excited with the news and the kiss, so I kissed him back. Everything escalated from there, and now we're officially dating!" I took a deep breath after spitting all that out very quickly.

"Well, you like him, don't you?"

Wow, that was blunt... and pretty effective at straightening out some of my thoughts! I blushed a little before answering. "Well, yeah I do."

She put on a sleepy smile before asking. "Then I'll ask again, what seems to be the problem? You like him, we both know he's liked you for months, and there's no more issues with Ulrich."

That really _was_ a good question. Yumi waited patiently while I thought for a minute. "He's my best friend, and the first good friend I've really ever had. I don't want to lose that."

She just smiled widely before taking another sip of her coffee. "Did you know that before we were dating, Ulrich and I were each other's best friends?"

I jerked my head back in surprise. "No, I didn't! I mean, I knew you two were close, but I always thought you spent so much time together because you had crushes on each other!"

Still smiling sleepily, she continued. "There was that, but we could read each other very well and tell each other anything. Well, I guess except how we really felt about each other."

"I never knew that. Well, there's another reason that you two are much better than him and I would have ever been. Having gotten to know him better, I'm not sure why I ever wanted to be with him in the first place! Sure, he's handsome, but he's just too broody for me."

She laughed, the coffee seemed to be kicking in. "He definitely can be, but I still love him. Want to know something else?"

"Umm, ok."

"Ulrich is still my best friend." She smiled warmly as I presumed she was thinking of Him. "We are even better friends now than before we started dating. I think the same will happen with you and Odd."

That was fairly reassuring. Just then we heard knocking at the door. Both surprised, Yumi and I exchanged glances before I looked at the clock, seeing it was 6:28. "I didn't invite anyone else." I informed Yumi as I got up and cracked the door to see Aelita standing there in her nightshirt. "Hi Aelita, what are you doing you doing up?"

"I was coming back from the bathroom and I heard talking in here. I wanted to make sure everything was ok. Who's in there with you?" I opened the door fully to let her in. "Oh, hi Yumi! What are you doing here?" She looked rather confused.

Yumi waved, still rather sleepily. "Well, want to fill her in?"

"Fill me in on what?" Aelita looked even more confused, and almost a little hurt at being left out of the loop while I went to Yumi. All three of us knew that I was much closer to Aelita.

I bade her to sit next to me, then proceeded to fill her in on everything that happened the night of the Christmas party, including my conversation with Yumi. I made sure to bring up Yumi's standing offer to talk about things with Odd, which looked like it made Aelita feel a lot better. "Hmm, Odd said that something happened when he came and saw me when he got back from break. That must have been it. The two of you seemed to be a little distant after that for a few weeks."

"Yeah we were. Knowing how he felt made me kinda uncomfortable at first, but he assured me that I didn't need to worry about it, and we got better."

"We noticed!" Aelita smiled briefly, but then looked confused again. "So, I know Yumi is here to talk with you about Odd now, but why at 6:30 in the morning?"

Yumi drank down the last of her coffee. "Because I got a call at 5:30 in the morning by a certain someone who was panicking." I could tell she was teasing, and the coffee seemed to have fully kicked in and she seemed to be in a better mood.

"I could see you freaking out over Lyoko, but Odd? You two seemed so happy yesterday."

Yumi chuckled. "That's what I said."

Aelita looked at me gravely. "Are you thinking of breaking up with him?"

My face scrunched up with how much that thought made my heart ache. "No, nothing like that! I guess I'm just... anxious."

Aelita breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm glad to hear that. Even as friends, you two have been so good for each other."

I smiled slightly, knowing it was true. "I... want to be his girlfriend, and I..." my words caught in my throat, and I glanced around the room. Any direction I looked, there was evidence that Odd had spent a lot of time here with me. I looked in the corner and saw his guitar propped up against the wall. He played it here often enough that he eventually just started leaving it. Looking past Yumi over to my desk, I saw the Christmas card he had everyone sign. Across the room from me, taped to my wardrobe door, were the sketches that Odd helped me with, plus a few of his own. The stereo wasn't playing now, but I went to sleep last night listening to Odd's CD he made me for Valentine's Day. When he wasn't here, I played it almost constantly. I turned my head around, then I let my gaze settle above the bed where I had hung the picture Odd had drawn of us.

"You know," Yumi's voice startled me slightly, and I turned towards her. "Ulrich told me that Odd drew that five times before he was satisfied. He also said that each one took a long time." Somehow that didn't surprise me.

I looked away. "Yeah, I love him." I finished my sentence and felt a warmth in my chest and cheeks as I felt a sheepish smile spreading across my face.

"Any better now that you got that out?" Asked Aelita.

"Yeah, I think so."

Yumi chuckled. "Good, because you two are going public in the biggest way possible in the next day or two!"

I looked at Yumi in confusion before Aelita chimed in. "You're talking about the picture Tamiya took yesterday in the rec room, aren't you?"

I groan loudly and clapped my hand to my forehead. "I forgot about that!" I felt a slight smirk come to my face, then looked up. "Well, I guess we'd better we ready no matter what then!" All three of us suddenly jumped to the sound of my alarm, and I ran over to turn it off. It was 7:00. "Sorry about that, I must have set it by habit."

Aelita looked at the time, gasped, and stood up. "Uh oh, I was going to meet Jeremy for breakfast!" Then she looked back at me and more calmly added, "I can tell him that I'll be along later if you want."

"I appreciate the offer, but I think I'm good now." I stood up and gave her a hug. "See you later, have a good time with Jeremy!" I teased with a wink. She blushed and left.

After she was gone, I looked at Yumi. "Finally, I get it about Jeremy!"

Yumi looked confused. "What do you mean?"

"First, about how he got to be friends with all of you in the first place. Second, what Aelita sees in him! I always thought he was just a goofy nerd."

Yumi laughed. "Well, he is a nerd, but he's also so much more!"

"I get that now, but the only thing I ever got out of Odd was that he'd do anything for Aelita."

"They're a good fit. So are you and Odd."

I blushed again. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

"I think you've liked him for longer than you realize."

"You know, you're probably right."

There was another knock at the door and both Yumi and I rolled our eyes at yet another unexpected visitor.

I opened the door to be pleasantly surprised that it was Odd! He looked nervous for some reason. "Hi, Sissi." He looked further in the room, "Yumi? What are you doing here?"

Yumi stood up. "Just a little girl-talk, I'll leave you two alone for a few minutes, but after that I'm going to need to hold you to our agreement!" As she walked out the door, I could tell that her coffee must have been already starting to wear off. She had to have been exhausted.

Odd looked confused, "what agreement?"

"That she can use my bed to take a nap. She's really tired." I explained. He still looked a little confused, but he let it go.

"Umm, ok." He shrugged, then continued. "Sissi, I know a lot of things happened in the last couple of days." He took a deep breath. "And now that things have calmed down a bit. I don't want you to feel pressured or rushed into anything that you weren't ready for... or maybe didn't want..." There were tears welling up in his eyes. I knew he'd wanted us to be together so badly, but his first concern was how I felt. Very much not like the Odd I used to know, but so much like the Odd I knew now. Yumi was absolutely right, I had been steadily falling in love with him for a long time, and I needed to make sure he knew that now that the dust had settled. "I'll still be..." I didn't let him finish. I took his face in my hands and stepped up to give him a slow kiss that lasted a long time. I caught him off-guard at first, but the surprise wore off quickly and he was enthusiastically returning it. I felt his arms wrap around my waist, and his hand on the small of my back, pulling me closer to him. I draped one arm around his shoulder while I caressed his face with my other hand. It was not the first kiss we had shared, but it was the first that wasn't rushed, or weighed down with the emotions of other events and revelations. I felt like I was floating, and it was amazing.

After several minutes we broke the kiss, but we held the embrace with Odd's head tucked into my shoulder. I whispered reassurance into his ear, "Odd, I adore you. It just took me a while to really see how much. I'm sorry for making you wait so long."

He nuzzled his face into my neck, where I could feel him smile. "You were worth the wait."

_Knock knock_

We both groaned as we reluctantly pulled away from each other. I cracked the door to see Yumi with her eyes mostly shut again. "I hate to cut you two short, but I'm falling asleep standing up. I only got around two hours of sleep last night!"

Oof, that was rough even by her standards! "Ok, we'll be right out." I turned to Odd and gave him another quick, but heartfelt kiss. "Alright, I've got to get changed. Go ahead and send Yumi in though, we don't need her passing out in the hall!"

He smirked "What's the big deal, it's nothing I haven't seen before!" 'PPBBTTHH'

I knew he was joking, so I played along. "And I said you're never seeing that again." I replied with as much over-the-top sweetness as I could.

"Touché, my darling" He feigned a bow, then grinned widely while walking out the door and Yumi walked in. She flopped on the bed without saying anything and immediately fell asleep. I pulled a spare blanket out of my closet and as I was draping it over her, I noticed the leather wristband I gave her for Christmas. It made me happy to see her wearing it. "Thanks for coming Yumi. You're a really good friend."

I quickly got changed and was about to open the door when I heard voices on the other side. I put my ear to the door.

"What are you doing up here Odd!?" It sounded like Claire, And she didn't sound happy. I guess she was one of the girls that didn't accept his apology. I kinda wanted to hear how he was going to respond.

"Umm... I'm waiting for Sissi..."

"Why? So you can prank her or something?" That one was Azra. Her accent was unmistakable. It always amazed me at just how discreet Odd had always been that almost no one knew he'd been coming. Then again, him and the rest of the group had a lot of practice sneaking around. I'd always been on good terms with both Claire and Azra, so I did appreciate their effort, however misguided it was.

"No, Nothing like that! I'm just waiting for her to finish getting changed, then we're going to hang out today." I wondered if he was going to say whether we were a couple or not. I kinda hoped he would, but he didn't know that.

Claire responded. "Yeah, right Odd! Everyone knows you two hate each other." I winced from that, knowing that nothing could be further from the truth, but almost no one knew it. Everyone probably still thought I ate lunch and dinner with the group to be near Ulrich, and that was going to have to change!

"That's not true! She's actually... my girlfriend." He did say it! That made me smile, though both the girls laughed. I wasn't surprised.

"Yeah, and let me guess, Yumi Ishiyama's in there helping her get ready, right?" They laughed again, and I looked back at Yumi and giggled a little myself. It seemed like Odd needed some help though. This was going to be fun!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! They've finally made it! This is part one of another monstrous chapter. There's only going to be one more official chapter, though I do have some other ideas for this continuity.


	14. Happy Together

_Twenty five weeks, late March_

_Happy Together_

**POV Odd**

Claire and Azra's relentless questioning was really getting out of hand. I needed Sissi to come out here and give me a little help! Fortunately, her door opened right then, and I breathed a sigh of relief. "Hi Claire, Azra, what's up?"

"Odd's going around saying that you're his girlfriend!" Azra responded accusingly. I looked back at Sissi sheepishly while rubbing the back of my neck.

Sissi walked up behind me and draped her arms around my shoulders, hugging me nonchalantly from behind. "Yeah, that's right." Both girls' jaws dropped. I felt myself beaming and I crossed my arms over hers, taking her hands in mine in the process. I leaned my head back into her, breathing in the sweet scent of vanilla I've come to associate with her. "Oh yeah, and please try to keep it down, Yumi's taking a nap. We had some early morning girl-talk." I barely stifled a chuckle at the shocked looks on their faces.

Azra recovered first. "Ok... joke's over, what's really going on?"

I answered this one. "No joke, no tricks. We're really dating. We've been spending a lot of time together these last few months and found that we really like each other... and yeah, Yumi really is in there."

Sissi continued. "Well, we only started dating yesterday, but this is something we both want." She gave me a little squeeze.

Claire rubbed her temples for a minute, then stopped and looked at us. "Just be careful Sissi. That sneaky rat two-timed me with Magali!"

"I know, and I appreciate your concern. This is going to sound cliché, but he's different now and I'm not worried. I know he apologized to you for it months ago, and I also know he really meant it." Sissi's head jerked upright. "Wait, were you one of the girls who slapped him!?" I completely deserved Claire's skepticism and worse, but I was not the same person now and having Sissi stick up for the person I'd become felt really good. There was no way I could possibly do something like that to her. To be honest, if things didn't work out between us, I didn't think I'd be able to do that to anyone else again either!

Claire's jaw dropped again. "How did you know that!?"

"Like he said, we'd been spending a lot of time together, and we talk about everything. We've been best friends for months." Sissi explained before kissing my temple. I felt my cheeks flush.

Azra shook her head, mouth slightly agape. "This is just too weird, I'm outta here!"

"Me too." followed up Claire, and they turned and left, both still shaking their heads.

After they were out of sight, Sissi pulled her arms away and we both doubled over laughing! "Ok, that was fun!" Sissi exclaimed.

"Yeah it was!" I said in return before putting my hand on the back of her neck and gently pulling her in for a brief kiss. I was so very happy that I could finally express my affection to her, and that wasn't going to get old anytime soon. Just as amazing was not having to dance around the topics that had been off limits for so long! Sissi looked about as happy about everything as I felt. "Let's go get some breakfast!" I took her hand in mine and we headed to the cafeteria.

Being this early on Sunday morning, there weren't very many people up yet. Even so, we got some pretty strange looks from the few people who saw us. Notable exceptions were Aelita, Jeremy, and Ulrich who were already here. Aelita and Jeremy just grinned widely when they saw our hands clasped, and Ulrich wore a good-natured smirk. I knew we were in for some more pestering, but that was ok. We went to go pick up our breakfasts and went to sit down.

Aelita smiled widely at us. "Well you're clearly feeling better!"

Sissi smiled back, "Yeah, I am."

Ulrich chuckled, looking at her. "You too, huh? Odd was a wreck this morning. He was worried sick about how you were handling everything!"

I smiled at Sissi. "I guess we were both a little nervous."

She just looked at Ulrich funny. "Yeah..." she said slowly. He started to notice too.

"Uhh, Sissi?" She startled as Ulrich said her name.

"Oh, sorry! I just didn't know if you would ever wear that, but I'm happy that you are." She pointed at the brown wristband she got him for Christmas. She showed them to me when she got them, and I thought they were a great idea.

He shrugged then smiled. "It's a nice gift that you clearly put a lot of thought into. It'd be a waste to just leave it in the box." Sissi looked delighted.

We all made small talk for the rest of breakfast, and soon we were clearing off our trays. "Hey Odd, can we go for a walk in the woods? It's a really nice morning and I'd like to enjoy it."

"I assume you'd like it to be just you two?" Jeremy asked.

I liked that idea. "That sounds good to me!" Meanwhile, Ulrich smirked again and Sissi noticed.

"What? Can't I want to take a nice romantic stroll through the park with my boyfriend?" She smiled even wider after saying 'boyfriend.' It was adorable. "Besides, we've never spent any time together anywhere but my room. It kinda feels like a dirty little secret and I just want to let it out!" We all laughed.

After breakfast, we split off from the group, hand in hand again, and we were about to head to the vending machines to grab something to drink, but Sissi tightened her grip on my hand and pulled me around the corner of a building. "What's wrong?" I asked.

"It's Hervé and Nicolas, they're at the vending machines."

"Umm, and...?"

"I haven't talked to them in a long time because I felt bad about how I used to treat them. Nicolas would be ok, but I think Hervé would freak out seeing us like this. He'll find out eventually, but I'm in a good mood and dealing with that now would probably ruin it."

Oh, I guess Hervé probably still had that crush on her. I didn't think of that. "How about I go get us a couple of sodas and bring them back. Then we'll head to the woods."

"Ok, sounds good!"

I walked over as nonchalantly as I could past the two boys. I hadn't really had hardly any interaction with them since Sissi started to eat with us.

"Hey, Della Robbia! I bet you think you're hot stuff since Sissi's been eating with you guys!" Hervé taunted.

I've felt a wide range of things because of Sissi eating with us, but never 'hot stuff!' "You know that I'm hot stuff no matter who I eat with!" A little bragging to sell the charade might be helpful. I walked to the vending machine and picked up two sodas as intended.

Hervé didn't seem to want to let up though. "So, who's the other one for! Another 2-day girlfriend!"

I chuckled. "Technically, this is day two, but this time she's the one for sure!" I started walking away.

"Yeah, well who is it this time!? I didn't think there was anyone left that wouldn't just slap you and walk away!" I bit my tongue and just kept walking. I was very thankful when they didn't follow, but when I turned the corner, I didn't expect to see William there talking with Sissi!

"William, I already know about Lyoko and XANA. They told me about it two days ago." What!? Now I was confused, and Williams eyes bugged out. Noticing I had walked up, they both turned and looked at me. Sissi smiled, but William turned away quickly and became really interested in the wall. "Hey sweetie!" I smiled back at Sissi.

"I've gotta go." William started walking away.

"Hey William!" I called after him. "We don't blame you, we all made mistakes. You were brand new and in over your head. It wasn't your fault."

He stopped and turned his head far enough that I could see a full profile. He was smiling slightly. "Thanks, Odd. I know that, but that's not why I've got to run. Good luck you two, later!"

As he left, I handed Sissi her soda and we started walking to the woods. "What was that all about?"

"He saw us holding hands this morning and asked if we were going out now, and I told him that we were."

"Ok, but what was that about Lyoko?"

She let out a nervous chuckle. "He was telling me to be careful because you guys had a weird history, so I told him I already knew about it. Was that ok?"

I snorted, then we started walking. "Yeah, that's fine. You can talk about it with any of us, and that includes William. He looked pretty shocked that we told you though. I feel bad for the guy. A couple weeks after we shut down the super computer, he told Ulrich that he needed some distance. None of us have really talked to him much since."

"That is too bad."

When we got to the woods, I took her hand again. We walked around for quite a while enjoying the stillness, and each other's company. Eventually she stopped at a large tree, tilted her head to the side, and stared at it. After a minute, she walked over and leaned back against it for a moment and waved me over. "Come here for a minute." I was a little confused, but I figured I'd play along. As I walked over, she put her hands on my shoulders and pulled me in and placed her lips on mine in the most gentle way imaginable. The fireworks in my head were already indescribable, but when I felt her soft fingers gently caress my cheek, I felt my mind blank completely.

"Wow." Was all I could whisper when we broke the kiss. I opened my eyes and saw her staring into them. She looked so very happy, but it looked like it was about something in particular. "Not that I'm complaining... at all, but what was that all about?"

She kept looking into my eyes. "I just wanted to make you happy, right here."

"You already make me happy." Her dark eyes sparkled in the morning light.

We left the tree and continued wandering around the woods hand in hand, occasionally stealing glances at each other and smiling. I knew the novelty would eventually wear off, but that wasn't going to stop me from enjoying the moment!

After our fourth time around the woods, it was time to head to lunch. We stopped at the edge of the woods and could see that it was much more crowded than it was this morning, and I started to dread how many stares we were going to get. I glanced over at Sissi and it looked like she was having the same thoughts. "Odd?"

"Yeah, Sissi."

"That's a lot of people..."

"Yep." I responded flatly. "And that's going to be a lot of staring..."

"Uh huh, and a lot of people that are probably going to ask a lot of questions..." she replied, clearly nervous at the prospect.

"I don't want to answer a lot of questions right now..."

"Me neither... ... ... but I don't want to stop holding your hand either."

"Me neither... it's quite the pickle."

She sighed. "Oh well." Reluctantly we unclasped our hands, neither one of us quite ready for that kind of publicity right now. Before we stepped into the clear, she took my face in both hands and kissed my forehead. "Now we can go."

The trip to the cafeteria was pretty uneventful. A few of the people that saw us this morning started pointing and whispering to whomever was there, but that was about it. When we arrived, the others were already there and eating. Yumi must have gotten enough sleep because she was there too. We picked up our food and sat down.

"It's not like you to be late for lunch good buddy, a little lovestruck?" Teased Ulrich.

"What can I say, it was a lovely stroll!" No amount of Ulrich's teasing was going to get me down today! Sissi didn't seem to mind either.

Jeremy cleared his throat with an uncharacteristically mischievous grin. "So... how much strolling did you actually get done!"

Knowing what he was insinuating, I feigned indignation. "If you must know, quite a bit, but a gentleman doesn't not kiss and tell!"

"We're dating, so we kissed. This shouldn't be shocking to any of you! Though most of the time really was spent walking." Sissi's response was completely deadpan, but she was smirking at me a little as if egging me on to continue. I thought I'd oblige!

"Ladies, it seems, are not bound by the same restrictions!" I smirked right back.

Sissi looked straight at Jeremy and Aelita, who were sitting next to each other. "You two should try it sometime, I think you'd like it!" They glanced at each other briefly, both turning about as red as a tomato.

I whispered to Sissi, "Aelita did kiss Jeremy once, but that was before she got her memories back. She became a lot more shy after that."

She jerked her head back to look at me, eyes wide. "Ok, you've got to tell me all about that later!" Not knowing exactly what I had said, only that it referred to them, the two geniuses glowed even redder.

I put my hand on hers. "Sissi, eventually I'm going to tell you everything. There's just a lot to tell."

"You mean brag about everything, right?" Joked Yumi, and everyone laughed, even Sissi!

"Some people just don't appreciate heroics." I said in self defense. There was much groaning and eye rolling at the table. The rest of lunch, along with the rest of the day went by uneventfully, but enjoyably. After lunch we all headed to the rec center. Now that it was the six of us, there weren't any more stares, which was welcome. Sissi and I ended up having a really good time discovering that we were equally terrible at ping pong, and eventually just ended up on the couch watching some mindless drivel on the tv while the others mostly played foosball. I was glad that they were willing to let us have this time mostly to ourselves.

Eventually it was time for dinner, which was also delicious! It was meatballs and gravy night! I loved Sissi, but I didn't think I'd ever understand how she can just eat a rabbit food salad for dinner every night! We all took turns telling Lyoko stories to Sissi; most of them involving her in some way. I think everyone appreciated being able to talk to someone that didn't already know every story, and I know she appreciated how much everyone was trying to make her feel included. Afterwards we went our separate ways. Ulrich and Yumi left and he was going to walk her home. The Einsteins went off to go do something techy that I didn't understand, and they kept stealing glances at each other the whole way out. Those two just needed to confess how they felt about each other already, it was getting tedious! Sissi and me agreed to split up to take our showers before meeting back up in her room.

After showering and getting into some clean day clothes (that I would probably wear tomorrow), I headed up to Sissi's room. There were a couple of other girls in the hall when I knocked on her door, and I got a couple more strange looks. After the encounter with Claire and Azra this morning, I didn't feel the need to be as discreet about coming here as I used to be, so I ignored them. Sissi opened the door, dressed in her dark pink PJ's, and we wrapped our arms around each other tightly. After we let go, I couldn't help glancing at the other girls in the hallway and chuckled at their wide eyes. Sissi heard me and glanced in their direction as well, giggling for the same reason before we walked inside her room.

When we got inside, she turned around and we just looked at each other for a minute. I marveled at how familiar this scene was, whilst feeling very different than it ever was before. Having just gotten back from the showers, she wasn't wearing any makeup, and her hair was a tangled wet mop. From her smile and the way her eyes were shining, I thought she had never looked more beautiful. I could feel a smile spilling forth on my face.

I had an idea. I reached up and stroked her face once before standing on my toes to give her a brief kiss. "How about you sit down for a second?" I guided her to the vanity stool where she sat and then I had her turn away from me. I grabbed her desk chair and sat down before taking a breath and hoping that I would be just as good at this as she was. I winked at her in the mirror and put my hands on her shoulders. She let out a small gasp as I pushed my thumbs into her shoulders and started rolling them up and down her back while she cooed and purred. While it sounded like I was doing a good job, I was surprised at how tiring it was and had to stop after about ten minutes.

She leaned back into me while I snaked my arms around her middle and hugged her close. "That was incredible," She murmured contently and I kissed her cheek. We just sat there for a few minutes enjoying the closeness of each other before she spoke again. "Odd, can we talk about something?"

"Of course, you know we can talk about anything." It was such a relief to be able to say that and have it be the truth!

"Well... I think I'm going to really like being your girlfriend, and this..." She wrapped her arms around her middle over mine and leaned back further into me. "... is amazing, but I don't want to lose what we had."

I was a little confused. "What do you mean?"

"You're my best friend, Odd. You're also the first real friend I've ever had. I love you both as my best friend, and as my boyfriend. I just don't want the talking, and joking, and all other the best friend stuff to get swallowed up by the boyfriend stuff."

I pulled my arms away and put my hands on her shoulders in a more 'friends' sort of way while gently smiling at her in the mirror. "I don't want that to go away either, because you're my best friend too." Then I leaned over her shoulder and kissed the side of her forehead. The corners of her lips turned up as she looked at me in the cutest way, then she glanced over on her vanity. Her expression went from sweet to thoughtful as she spied her hairbrush before she picked it up and handed it to me as I stood up. I grinned widely at her and started running it through her beautiful hair. We talked and joked for the rest of the evening while I brushed her hair. Once in a while I would kiss the top of her head, and she would smile or giggle.

Unfortunately, it came time for me to go. I put her brush down then she stood up and we hugged each other tightly. "I had a great time today, Odd."

I smiled into her neck, where my face was buried. "Me too."

We parted the embrace, kissed each other goodnight, and I left for my own room.

"Hey there, good buddy! Looks like someone's in a good mood." Ulrich greeted me when I walked in.

"Hi, Ulrich." I couldn't help the grin that was plastered on my face.

"Have a good time with your girlfriend?" Here came the pestering.

"Yep, I did."

"Glad to hear it. One thing keeps bothering me though." I cocked an eyebrow at him. "Until two days ago, you said that nothing was ever going to happen between the two of you. Obviously, you were lying, why?"

This was a question of thought about quite a bit. "Because she didn't need any of you guys bothering her about it while she was trying to get her feelings about _you_ sorted out. I figured if I denied it then I would probably take the brunt of it for denying something that was probably obvious to you guys leaving her in the clear to figure things out."

Ulrich's jaw dropped. "Since when did you become so insightful!?"

I smirked as I started changing. "I've always been insightful!" He looked at me skeptically. "It's just that now I care enough to pay attention to the insight!" I finished changing and crawled into bed. "Goodnight Ulrich!"

"Night, Odd."

That night I went to sleep happier than I could ever remember being, and I looked forward to spending a lot more time with Sissi in places other than her room!

_Beep beep beep beep_

Morning came way too soon, and with it came the alarm clock. I groaned loudly as Ulrich turned it off. "Hey good buddy." I sleepily called over to him. I had to make sure of something.

"Yeah, Odd?"

"What happened yesterday...?"

He cocked an eyebrow at me. "What, you don't remember?"

"For a moment, just pretend I don't."

"You spent the whole day with Sissi, and you liked it!" He replied with a laugh.

An enormous grin split my face. "You bet I did. Thanks, good buddy, I just wanted to make sure I didn't dream it all up!" It wouldn't have been the first time I dreamt all that! I was wide awake now and leapt out of bed to get dressed. I also messaged Sissi.

_Walk to breakfast with me?_

_Of course!_ Was her reply.

_Meet at your room?_

_Nah, I'm coming to yours for a change!_ ;)

With that I warned Ulrich about her imminent arrival and he managed to finish getting dressed just before we heard a knock at the door. I opened the door and Sissi immediately stepped in and pulled me into a rather lengthy kiss.

"Hey, I'm still here you know..." complained Ulrich.

We broke the kiss, both grinning like the Cheshire Cat. "Fine, fine. We're going!" Sissi replied.

On our way downstairs, both our phones beeped at the same time. We got identical texts, mine from Jeremy, and hers from Aelita.

_Your guys' picture has been published in the Kadic news, and the whole school is buzzing. You might want to stick together._

We planned on sticking together anyway, but the warning was appreciated. Just before we walked out, we could see that there were a lot of students through the windows. Many of them had newspapers.

"That's a lot of people again..." I remarked.

"Yep. A lot of people who thought we hated each other this morning."

"Uh huh. R _e_ ady to set the record straight?"

She glanced my direction. "Not yet." I looked back at her; an eyebrow raised in curiosity. She took my face in her hands and gave me a quick, but good, kiss. "Now I'm ready!" She exclaimed and we walked out the double doors hand in hand.

Fin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First: This chapter was a beast to write for some reason, and not just because it's the last official chapter of this story.
> 
> Second: This is the end of this particular story, but I am not done with this timeline, not by a long shot! I'm looking forward to starting my new project, but I've got a couple of small things I want to do first.
> 
> Last: I figured after this journey, I wanted to make this last chapter nice and fluffy, I hope you like it!
> 
> See you on the next one!


	15. Bonus Chapter: A Romantic Tour

_Bonus chapter. Late November_

_Two years, Eight months later_

_Second year of college for Yumi, first year for the rest._

_Three years, 2 months after XANA's deletion_

_A Romantic Tour_

**POV Odd**

I was busy studying in my room when I got the call.

"Hey Odd, it's Jeremy."

"Hey, Einstein! What's up?"

"Well... you're going to be in France to see Sissi over Christmas break, right?" He seemed a little apprehensive about something.

"Yeah, that's right."

"Umm... Aelita and I are also going to be close by and we had already talked to Ulrich and Yumi about it, and they're ok with it..."

The way he was rambling was kinda ridiculous. "Just spit it out Einstein!" I heard some rustling in the speaker and a muffled 'gimme the phone.' Probably from Aelita.

"Odd. Jeremy and I have some research to do for our classes." Yep, it was Aelita, and she was chuckling at Jeremy's stammering. "Jeremy's got genetics and I've got a high-level programming course, and it would've very helpful for us if we could start the supercomputer back up." My eyes shot open with excitement! It wasn't surprising that the geniuses were in their first semester of collage and already in high level classes. "Yumi wasn't very happy about it, but agreed to be there, and Ulrich was okay with it even though he won't be able to make it. If you're okay with it, then you could show Sissi around Lyoko, minus XANA and monsters."

"You bet I'm on board! I'll call Sissi right away!"

"Alright Odd, see you in about a month."

"Later!" I heard Jeremy say 'bye' in the background.

I immediately speed dialed Sissi. "Odd sweetie! Hi! How are things?" Her smile was practically audible. I absolutely adored hearing it and I felt my own smile stretch from ear to ear.

"Hi Beautiful, things are going good, I've got a question for you. How would you like a tour of Lyoko...?"

_Mid December, Friday evening_

**POV Sissi**

Yumi and I were waiting in the front room of the place called the hermitage. The rest of the group had told me about it, but I'd never been here before myself. It was kinda weird knowing that this rundown old house is where Aelita grew up... ten years before the rest of us!

I couldn't have been more excited... or nervous. I was finally going to the place of their adventures! The rest of the group had really done everything they could to help me feel included, and I couldn't have been more grateful. Jeremy even loaned me his video diary, though I think there were some ones that got a little personal with his feelings about Aelita that he left out. Even so, this was the last thing they could possibly do to include me, and I felt a little overwhelmed.

"They're late." Complained a not-very-happy Yumi.

I put my hand on her shoulder attempting to be supportive. As the only ones of the group still in France, her and I had gotten very close in the last few months, even more than before. "I know you wish Ulrich could make it, I do too, but you know that he would be risking his soccer scholarship if he skipped out on the practices he has this week." Any jealously she may have felt from a comment like that in the past was long gone. After almost three years of dating, Odd and I were completely devoted to each other. Ulrich was my friend only, and neither one of us had any desire to change that.

She sighed heavily. "I know, but it's not just that. When we shut down the supercomputer, I was really hoping it was for good. I'm not sure why I agreed to starting it back up."

Any response I had was cut short by the front door opening and in walked two short blonde young men, one with a purple splotch I front and a pink haired young woman.

I couldn't make out exactly what was said by anyone because the relative silence exploded into a clamoring of greetings between the five of us, but somewhere in the midst of the chaos, I felt Odd's arms wrap around me and his face tuck into my neck like he always did as I wrapped my arms around him as well. He had grown a few inches over the last couple years, but I had grown more, and I was resting my cheek on the top of his head. I felt whole again, and the noise just faded into the background. My Best Friend had come home and was in my arms again, for a while at least.

"I missed you." I barely heard him whisper over the din.

I whispered back, "I missed you too."

An hour later we were all standing in the scanner room while Jeremy went to throw the switch. With a thunk, the lights all turned on and my stomach knotted.

"Alright, I'm going to materialize the girls first into sector 5." Jeremy's voice came over a speaker from somewhere in the room.

"Hey Jeremy, could you actually materialize Sissi and me into the desert sector? Sector 5 isn't exactly what you'd call scenic." Odd requested.

"And the desert sector is?"

"Just go with it!"

"Sure thing, Odd." Yumi and Aelita got in the scanners. Before they closed, Yumi flashed me a thumb's up and Aelita winked at us.

_Scanner Yumi, Scanner Aelita_

_Transfer Yumi, Transfer Aelita_

_Virtualization_

After a few seconds the scanner doors opened back up and they were gone! I knew it was going to happen, but seeing it really happen was just surreal!

"Alright you two, your turn!" Jeremy called over the speaker.

Odd pulled me in for a quick kiss, then reassured me, "there's no need to be scared, I'll see you inside my dear." I only chuckled nervously, his calm really helping me keep my own cool as we both walked into our respective scanners. I waved weakly to him as the doors closed and I was alone and trapped. My heart started thudding like a hammer in my chest as I heard Jeremy's voice.

_Scanner Odd, Scanner Sissi_

_Transfer Odd, Transfer Sissi_

_Virtualization_

I felt the bizarre sensation of floating and being buffeted by wind from below, and then nothing. The next thing I knew, I saw myself about ten feet from the ground and falling! I let out a short squeak as I fell and landed on my backside. I didn't really feel it as much as I knew that it happened and my mind sort of filled in the blank. It was an odd sensation to say the least! I looked around to see that there wasn't much here, but it looked like I was inside of a video game!

"It's official now, welcome to the club!" I heard Jeremy's voice state enthusiastically from... everywhere...

"You could have warned me about the drop!" I grumbled.

"It's ok, we all fell on our butt the first time, it's like a rite of passage!" I heard Odd say from behind me. "Let me help you up." I looked to the side saw a large purple paw-hand extended towards me!

"Ahh! What the!" I squealed and backed away from it. When I looked up at the body attached to the paw-hand, I started giggling! "You look like a giant purple CAT!" I knew Yumi was a geisha, and Ulrich was a samurai, but Odd had been conspicuously silent on what he looked like and now I knew why! "And why do you have a picture of Kiwi peeing on your chest!

He looked at me a little sadly, and the little kitty ears on his head drooped. "And I was going to say that you looked as beautiful as ever." I felt bad now, which stopped my laughter. After all, he was still my 'Odd Dearest,' even if he did look a little ridiculous.

"I'm sorry." I took his still-offered hand and he helped me up. "You look kinda silly, but you're still really cute!"

It looked like that made him feel a bit better, and the ears perked back up. It was cute! "And you look quite dashing my darling!"

I looked down to see myself for the first time. I was wearing a long black sleeveless coat, with a white shirt under it with full length puffy sleeves. A pair of breeches and knee-high leather boots. At my side was a long slender sword with a very fancy hand guard strapped to a thick leather belt. Apparently, I was some sort of musketeer or swashbuckler! That would make some sense given my French heritage.

"Hey Einstein, could you..." what looked like a floating purple surfboard appeared in front of us. "Never mind!" I was amazed when Odd did a double front flip with a half twist landing on the board! "Our agility on Lyoko is many times greater than in the real world." Odd explained after seeing my shocked expression. Even though I wasn't as confident as he was, I still amazed myself by mounting the board with a no-hands cartwheel with ease. "There you go!" He beamed. I grabbed onto his waist for balance and we took off immediately!

"The desert sector is the most boring sector for riding around in, but it's the safest to get a handle on riding because of the wide flat stretches of uninterrupted land." He explained as he put us through a tight slalom to get me used to riding with him. He turned back for a second and flashed me a mischievous smirk before pushing the board into a corkscrew dive. When he abruptly leveled out, I lost my grip on him and started to fall backwards but something wrapped around my waist and caught me before I fell off the board. When I looked down, I saw it was his tail!

"You did that on purpose!" I shouted at him slapping him in the arm, hard. Unfortunately, I'm sure he didn't feel it any more than I felt the impact on my hand. It was a little disappointing. He made a point to ignore it, and simply pulled me closer with his tail.

"Hey Einstein, where's the nearest waytower to the forest sector?"

"It's southwest from your current position. Just so you know, it's kind of a long way." Jeremy's voice came from nowhere again. It was weird.

"Can he see us wherever we go?" I asked Odd.

"Kinda, but only our position. He can't see exactly what's going on. By the way, step on the very end of the board and hang on!" I did so and felt something depress as the board took off like a rocket. I shrieked a little at the sudden acceleration and wrapped my arms tightly around Odd.

Soon enough we were at what must have been the waytower and I started to get nervous as Odd was headed right for it! I felt a bit of relief when he slowed down quite a bit and warned me when we phased right through the wall and he looped the board straight up within the tower and then tightly turned it straight back down into the eerie darkness under the tower platform.

As we traveled through that tunnel, I gazed in wonder at the blue lines of code that were flying by. It was quite spectacular, and I found myself grinning like an idiot at the wonder of it all! Eventually I even let go of Odd and put my hands out and enjoyed the 'sensation' of floating for a few seconds before Odd told me that I would want to hang on again. Shortly after that we exploded out of the waytower into what must've been the forest sector. Everywhere you looked there were impossibly tall trees, and the ground was a maze of different pathways.

"Ready for a ride!?" Odd called out enthusiastically.

I knew he meant that he was going to go wild on this one, but by now I'd started getting pretty confident. "You bet!"

He kicked it into high gear, zigging and zagging through the trees. Sometimes he'd kick the board high into the air just to dive back down to pull it level at the last second. The first minute or so was nerve wracking, but I quickly got the hang of it and was soon having the time of my life! We continued to duck and weave, completely in sync with each other getting more and more gutsy with our maneuvers until we eventually bit off more than we could chew and ended up wiping out! The way my mind filled in the gaps of sensation was a little unpleasant as we tumbled along, but when we came to a stop, I happened to end up landing on top of him and neither one of us could seem to stop laughing at the sheer exhilaration of it all!

After we managed to calm down, Odd retrieved his board and we hopped back on. "Hey Jeremy, where's the waytower to the ice sector?"

"It's due north from your current position." I was starting to get used to Jeremy's disembodied voice.

"Thanks buddy!" Odd responded and we took off again. This time we took a more leisurely pace while weaving through the trees until we came across the waytower and entered.

After we entered this time, he stopped the board. "Hop off and jump down yourself. It's a bit different than on the board."

"Umm, okay." I get off and stand at the edge of the platform. I looked down into the dark well with a little trepidation, but I'd already traveled this way once before and it ended up being ok. I glanced back at Odd for a moment, then leapt off the platform headfirst and let myself get carried away in the exhilaration of the free fall. After a short time, I found myself bursting out of the tower on the other side with Odd following closely.

Looking around, the cool blues and twilight appearance of this sector was very pretty.

"Hop on sweetheart!" Odd called out. I mounted the board with a flip, and we took off into the sky.

Looking down, I could see the pretty blue terrain was marked by mountains, pools of water, and even a couple of waterfalls! It was gorgeous.

This ride was much slower paced than the last two, but that was fine because this was far more scenic and romantic. I wrapped my arms around Odd's waist and hugged him close from behind. "This is amazing. Thanks for bringing me here." He glanced back at me smiling before descending and aiming for a hole in one of the mountains.

Upon entry, we wound uphill through a curvy chute that would probably be a lot of fun to side down but was also cool to be able to ascend slowly and take our time to appreciate being within an ice tunnel through a mountain! When we reached the end of the tunnel, Odd took us up a winding path to the top of an even higher mountain where we found a flat top to stop at.

"It's a lot easier to enjoy the view when you're not trying to save the world." He was joking, but the truthfulness of it once again hammered home that he, along with his friends, were unsung heroes who had put their lives on the line repeatedly. Knowing that their secrecy had literally meant life-or-death, and the fate of the world, made it a much easier for me to forgive them for hiding it from me for as long as they did.

After we dismounted and I hugged him close. Even though I couldn't feel him, the emotion was still there. "I'm happy you all made it through, especially you." When we pulled apart, we just stood on the mountain top and looked out over the whole sector. From the lovely pools of 'water,' to the waterfall in the distance, and even the treacherous beauty of the digital sea. The ambiance of all of it was made all the more romantic with the perpetual twilight. I could see how this would be an awful place to be stuck like Aelita was, but to visit it was truly a place of wonder!

"Would you like to see Yumi and Aelita on Lyoko?" He asked me after a while.

"Of course!"

"Jeremy?" He called out.

"I heard; I'll send the girls your way once we're done. It shouldn't take much longer."

"That's kinda creepy knowing that he hears everything." I commented.

"Sorry, I can disconnect the audio feed if you want. It's never been an issue before because we were always on mission."

"Yes please!" We both sat down cuddled next to each other and admired the view for a while longer while we waited for Aelita and Yumi.

Neither one of us knew how much time had passed, and neither of us cared, but eventually we saw movement in the distance which we assumed was the others. When they got closer, I was able to see that Yumi was riding on what must have been the overwing. It had been described to me before. Aelita, on the other hand, flew on a pair of feathered wings. I'd been told about them, but I had no idea that they would be so beautiful! Clearly, even then she had meant a lot to Jeremy for him to put that much care into something that made her look so angelic, especially when I knew he had so little free time back then.

"Hi guys!" Greeted Yumi, stepping off the overwing.

Aelita landed next to her. "Well, how did you like your tour?"

"It's an amazing place to visit, but I can understand why you wanted out." I answered. "By the way, those wings are beautiful! Jeremy did a wonderful job."

If we weren't on Lyoko, I'm sure she would have been blushing. Even so, she turned away slightly. "Thanks, Sissi. If you'll excuse a little corniness, he has always been 'the wind beneath my wings.'"

"Well, ready to go back?" Asked Odd.

"Yeah. I'm ready to feel things again." I answered.

"Alright guys, I'm bringing you in!" I watched in amazement as Aelita and Yumi started dissolving from the bottom up. It was a little unsettling, even though I knew that this was normal.

"Well, see you at home!" Odd was cheerful as ever, and I freaked out only a little as I watched my feet start dissolving too. Before I knew it, I was back in the scanner, and exhausted! Those returns were no joke! The scanner opened and I fell forward into Yumi's waiting arms.

"I figured your first time might be a little rough." She joked.

"Yeah, thanks." I managed to say between breaths. "And this used to be normal for you guys!"

"Yep, devirtualization was never pleasant. As least this time we don't have to rush to save Jeremy from a Spector or something!" She helped me sit on the floor against the wall and Odd walked over and sat next to me.

"Well, did you have a good time!" He asked, putting his arm around me.

"Yeah, I did." I leaned my head over on his shoulder and feeling his warmth next to me I quickly ended up falling asleep.

I don't know how much time had passed before I woke up, but I found myself in a bed. I glanced around and saw Odd lying on top of the covers fully clothed and groaned. He woke up, and he must have sensed my confusion. "We're at my hotel room." He whispered.

I noticed that I was also still dressed, and I smiled. We'd never slept overnight in the same bed before, so of course he would have the decency to make sure I wasn't put in any uncomfortable situations. I still wasn't ready for _that_ , but we were still fully dressed. "What are you doing, get in here and snuggle." I whispered back. He got in and put his back against me and we fell asleep cuddling in the exact position as the first time we ever got this close at the Christmas party years ago.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The idea for this chapter is longer than the rest of the story. I originally wanted to do something like this all the way back in 'what came next 2.' However, with the supercomputer being Hopper's final resting place at that time, I couldn't bring myself to have them turn the supercomputer on at the time and disturb his rest. However, as of the end of 'what came next 3' he's no longer there, so there is no disrespect to be had here. I also needed a reason to turn it on. The original reason was going to be Milly and Tamiya following the group when they were showing Sissi the lab, but I figured between programming, quantum physics, and genetics, I could come up with some reason relating to College classes.


	16. Epilogue

_Epilogue_

_Four years after XANA's defeat_

_September_

**POV Aelita**

Before we had all went our separate ways after high school and headed off to college, we agreed that so long as we were able, we'd try our very best to get together around the anniversary of XANA's defeat. It was always a bittersweet time for me because it was also the anniversary of my father's death, so I was glad to be able to spend it with friends.

The six of us were walking to some fancy restaurant downtown. Odd had insisted and said his parents were treating us for some reason. Arriving at the restaurant, Odd talked to the host about our reservation, but for some reason Ulrich and Yumi stayed outside for a minute.

"Hey, could someone go get the lovebirds, we're being seated!" Odd called out, and Jeremy pokes his head out the door and told them to hurry up.

After being seated and ordering, we made small talk and reminisced about old times while we ate. After everyone was done eating, Odd stood up.

"Hello everyone, my name is Odd Della Robbia, and I've got a few things to say." He called out loudly to the whole restaurant. The rest of us looked at each other in confusion. It looked like even Sissi didn't know what was going on. "This is going to start a little strange but stay with me it'll be worth it." He had the attention of everyone including the staff. "When I was eleven, my grandparents passed away and left all their grandkids, including me, some money. Now don't go getting the wrong idea, I'm not rich or anything like that, but it was enough to do something cool with. The catch was that I couldn't touch it until I was eighteen, which at the time seemed like a real drag." He started walking around a little while talking for dramatic effect and was completely eating up the attention! "When I got a little older, however, I was glad that I couldn't touch it because I would have probably wasted it. I started wanting to do something important, like putting the down payment on a car, or using it for rent, or maybe even using it for school. But I also wanted it to be meaningful. I'll eventually get a car, I'll eventually pay off my student loans… eventually…" he rolled his eyes sarcastically and there was a chuckle through the restaurant, "and I pay my rent every month on time already." He stopped walking and stood right next to Sissi and gazed straight at her. She noticeably gulped and stared at Odd with eyes growing wider by the second. "Over the last three and a half years, I've realized that nothing is, or ever will be more meaningful," He extended his hand to her and helped her to her feet, "or important, as asking my Best Friend if she would be willing to share the rest of her life with me." I put my hand to my mouth in awe as he pulled a black velvet box out of his pocket and opened it towards her, displaying a beautiful rose gold ring with an intricate swirl pattern and a solitaire diamond. "I love you Sissi." He got down on one knee.

_Will you marry me?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With this, the story is 100% complete and won't be touched again. I really hope that you ended up liking it!
> 
> Just so you know, I've got more in store for the 'What Came Next' continuity. next stop, college!


End file.
